Legal Case Summary
R v Miller [1983] 2 AC 161
ACTUS REUS – DUTY OF CARE – OMISSION
Facts
The defendant was a vagrant who had spent the evening drinking before returning to the property where he was squatting. He fell asleep with a lit cigarette in his hand, which started a fire. The defendant woke and, seeing the fire, took no steps to extinguish it but simply moved to sleep in a different room. Eventually the whole house caught fire, causing over £800 worth of damage. The defendant was charged with arson.
Issues
Because the prosecution relied on the ground that the defendant had failed to take any action to extinguish the fire in addition to the fact that he had been reckless in starting the fire by falling asleep with a lit cigarette, the question arose whether the defendant could be liable for an omission. If it was not, then the actus reus of arson was not present and no conviction for arson would be possible.
Decision/Outcome
The court concluded that as he was responsible for having created the dangerous situation, the defendant was under a duty to take action to resolve it once he became aware of the fire. It was not necessary that the defendant was subjectively aware of the risk of damage posed by the fire, provided that this would be obvious to a reasonable person who troubled to turn his mind to the matter. The defendant was therefore liable for his omission to take any steps to put out the fire or seek held, and was accordingly convicted of arson.
Updated 20 March 2026
This case summary accurately reflects the decision in R v Miller [1983] 2 AC 161 as confirmed by the House of Lords. The principle that a defendant who inadvertently creates a dangerous situation comes under a duty to act once they become aware of it remains good law and continues to be cited in criminal law. The case is still routinely applied in English criminal law as authority for liability through omission where the defendant is the cause of the dangerous situation. There have been no subsequent statutory changes or leading appellate decisions that have overturned or materially qualified this principle. One minor point of clarification: the article states it was not necessary for the defendant to be subjectively aware of the risk, provided it would be obvious to a reasonable person. This reflects the objective recklessness standard applicable at the time (derived from MPC v Caldwell [1982] AC 341), but readers should note that the House of Lords in R v G [2003] UKHL 50 overruled Caldwell and restored a subjective test for recklessness in criminal damage and arson. The duty-to-act principle from Miller itself was not disturbed by R v G, but the recklessness standard now applicable to arson is subjective. The article’s description of the recklessness element may therefore be misleading in its current form.
