ABSTRACT
When assessing a defendant's liability, the orthodox approach is necessarily narrow and precise in its focus. A draft was also presented at the University of Sussex as part of the Criminal Law, Criminal Justice and Criminology Group within the Centre for Rights and Responsibilities. It is contended that this is the best approach to Category I cases, constructing liability through the application of standard rules. The descriptive criticism likewise, for result crimes, has little impact. It is on this basis I the object to blocking defences on the basis of negligence, as seen in the current law of duress. The current law, through the intoxication rules, will construct liability for offences classified as basic intent, but not for offences classified as specific intent. If intoxication is equivalent to the missing mens rea, then appropriate criminalisation of the 'offence with mens rea' will be equally applicable in the intoxication context. In doing so, it has rejected criticism of inconsistency between categories.
