Attorney General's Reference (No 2 of 1992) [1993] 4 All ER 683
Attorney General's Reference (No 2 of 1992) [1993] 4 All ER 683
COURT OF APPEAL, CRIMINAL DIVISION
LORD TAYLOR OF GOSFORTH CJ, JUDGE AND BLOFELD JJ
10, 27 MAY 1993
The respondent, a heavy goods lorry driver, after driving between 10 am and 4 pm with regulation breaks, had a two-hour break and then set off again. After driving for a total of over 6 hours out of the preceding 12, during which time he had covered 343 miles, he steered, apparently deliberately, onto the hard shoulder of the motorway and drove some 700 metres along it with only inches to spare on either side before crashing into a stationary white van which had its hazard lights flashing. There was a recovery vehicle in front of the van with
flashing yellow lights. Two persons standing between the two vehicles received fatal injuries when the van was pushed into the recovery vehicle. Marks on the road showed that the respondent’s lorry had braked only at the very last moment. The respondent was charged with causing death by reckless driving. At his trial the prosecution alleged that the respondent had fallen asleep at the wheel. The defence produced expert evidence from a psychologist who described a condition known as ‘driving without awareness’, in which the driver’s capacity to avoid a collision ceased to exist because repetitive visual stimuli experienced on long journeys on straight, flat, featureless motorways induced a trance-like state in which the focal point for forward vision gradually came nearer and nearer until the driver was focusing just ahead of his windscreen. On the basis of that evidence the defence contended that the respondent was in a state of automatism at the time of the accident and was therefore not to be regarded as driving at all. The judge left the defence of automatism to the jury, who acquitted the respondent. The Attorney General referred to the Court of Appeal the question whether the defence of automatism was open to the respondent.
