R v Jordan

Ratio Decidendi

ข้อเท็จจริง

Jordan stabbed a man, who was taken to hospital. By the time he died about eight days later, the stab wound had mainly healed and was no longer life-threatening. Fresh medical evidence admitted on appeal showed that death had in fact been caused by the hospital's treatment: the victim had been given a large dose of an antibiotic (terramycin) to which he had already shown he was intolerant, and had also been given excessive quantities of intravenous fluids, leading to fatal pulmonary complications.

สรุปคำพิพากษา

The Court of Criminal Appeal quashed Jordan's conviction for murder. On the fresh medical evidence, death had been caused not by the stab wound — which was substantially healed and no longer dangerous — but by 'palpably wrong' medical treatment: administering a drug to which the deceased was known to be intolerant and giving excessive intravenous fluids. Where the original wound has ceased to be an operating cause and death results from a supervening cause that is itself so independent and potent, and the treatment is palpably wrong, the chain of causation between the defendant's act and the death is broken, and the defendant is not guilty of homicide. The decision has, however, been treated as very exceptional and confined to its facts: later cases (R v Smith and R v Cheshire) held that ordinary or even negligent medical treatment will not break the chain of causation so long as the original wound remains an operating and substantial cause of death. Jordan therefore stands as a rare example of negligent treatment severing causation.

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