R v Cosier 2026
C and his friend, B, had been drinking throughout the day of the 14th March 2024 in the Queens Head Pub. B was engaged in a long-running argument with the victim (P). C got involved in the argument and was overheard having a heated phone conversation with P. During the evening, C went into the pub kitchen on several occasions. He picked up various knives and discussed how to stab someone through their ribs. At 10:34pm, P arrived at the pub and approached C and B. There was a short scuffle and P left. At 10:36pm, C went to the pub kitchen again and picked up another knife, taking it outside the pub to where P was, holding it behind his back. C and P exchanged words and C entered and exited the pub various times. After he went out for a third time, there was a fight on the street in which P fired a BB gun at C and C fatally stabbed P. C handed himself in to the police the following day.
C gave a prepared statement in his police interview which stated that P had shot C multiple times to the head and neck and that C had acted in self-defence.
C was convicted of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment.
At trial, C submitted that manslaughter based on loss of control ought to be left for the jury to consider as an alternative to murder, the judge disagreed. Following his subsequent conviction, C appealed conviction on the single ground that the judge was wrong to not allow the partial defence of loss of control to be left to the jury. C argued that the judge made a series of judgments on the evidence which were properly for the jury and drew inferences supportive of his own view rather than taking a balanced and objective view about what the jury might conclude.
Held
Appeal dismissed.
The court considered the trial judge was right to conclude that there was no sufficient evidence of loss of control to justify leaving the defence to the jury.
The trial judge noted that C had not at any point asserted a loss of control; indeed, his evidence was that his actions had been rational and measured throughout. The absence of any assertion by C that he had lost control was a powerful point against him, and the judge was entitled to make that observation.
The court were unable to accept the submission that C’s lack of recollection of stabbing P was or could have been inferred to be the sort of phrase a layman might use to denote a loss of control.
The court agreed with the judges assessment of C’s actions before and after the stabbing as rational and deliberate.
In relation to the CCTV evidence presented, the court agreed with the judges description that it did not show a frenzied attack, rather a short and intense chase with the knife held out and brandished towards P.
Further, the court were not persuaded that it was open to the jury to draw the inference that C had lost self-control, even if there was no primary evidence of such a loss. The inference could not be properly drawn from the CCTV or from the fact that C had been shot in the face with a BB gun. The evidential basis for the inferences on these two points was simply not present.
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