R v Dudley and Stephens [1884] 14 QBD 273

• Defendants were on a raft after shipwreck and having gone 7 days without food and 5 without water they decided to kill and eat Victim who was the weakest and looked like he would die soon anyway. Later they were rescued.

• Defendants argued that since there was no prospect of rescue at the time of the killing (accepted by court) that there ought to be a defence of necessity.

• HL upheld convictions for murder.

Lord Coleridge

• Said that even though temptation in this case would be insurmountable, the law sometimes has to set up unrealistically high standards (presumably to assert the principle that each individual has a right not to be killed) and compassion for Defendant doesn’t change the legal definition.

• Lord Coleridge said that sometimes one had a duty to sacrifice one’s own life and that one could obviously not be a fair judge of necessity when one has an interest:

  • I.e. Defendant was taking the decision about whether it was worth sacrificing another for his sake. 

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