Transferred Malice
The doctrine that a defendant who intends to commit a crime against one person but instead harms a different, unintended victim is still guilty as if they had harmed the person they intended to harm.
Independent editorial summary — not the official statute text. Read the official version on legislation.gov.uk.
Criminal liability does not depend on the defendant hitting their intended target: if D aims a blow, or fires a shot, or otherwise directs harmful conduct at one person (P) but it in fact harms a different person (V), the law transfers D's guilty intent from P to V. The Judicial College's Crown Court Compendium reflects this in its model jury directions for homicide, providing for a 'direction on transferred malice (if D aims at P but kills V, that is no defence)' — confirming that the defendant cannot escape liability for V's death simply because V was not the person they meant to harm.
The doctrine only transfers malice between the same type of offence — traditionally, intent to commit one kind of harm cannot be transferred to convict of a different kind of crime altogether (for example, intent to damage property cannot found a conviction for assault if a person is unexpectedly injured). Within that limit, however, transferred malice means the identity of the actual victim is irrelevant to the defendant's culpability: what matters is that the defendant deliberately, rather than accidentally, carried out the act that caused the harm.
Example
If D throws a punch intending to hit P but misses and instead strikes V, D can be convicted of an offence against V based on the intent D had toward P, because the malice transfers to the actual victim.
Related terms
Official sources
This explanation is drawn from the official sources below; every substantive statement is verified against them. For advice on a specific matter, see our find help page.