Someone claimed that "You can get off the hook for criminal cases if inebriated for a specific crime of intent", so I dug this article up:
"With only minor exceptions, the intoxication rules in the Indian, Singaporean, and similar Penal Codes do not create an affirmative defence. Indeed, one can go further. Given the fundamental structure of modern criminal law, it is logically impossible for the core intoxication doctrine to operate as an affirmative, substantive-law defence. This holds equally under the common law as it does under the Indian Penal Code and its regional variants...
First, consider a case under the Indian or Singaporean Penal Codes where the defendant does actually have mens rea. Suppose that D is (involuntarily) intoxicated. Someone has spiked his drink or his food. While in that condition, D attacks and injures V with intent to do so. Suppose further that D would not have acted as he did but for being intoxicated. None the less, in such a case, D straightforwardly commits the offence of voluntarily causing hurt. He satisfies the actus reus and mens rea of the offence...
In R v. Kingston, D went to P's flat by invitation to discuss a business proposition. Once there, he was given coffee that P had deliberately laced with drugs. D was then led by P to a bedroom where a young boy, also drugged, lay unconscious on the bed. D indecently assaulted the boy. P filmed the activity and subsequently sought to blackmail D. When the matter came to light, D was charged with indecent assault. His conviction was upheld by the House of Lords on the basis that D had mens rea at the time. D was aware of what he was doing; his claim was only that, but for being surreptitiously drugged, he would not have acted as he did. On these facts, intoxication was held to be irrelevant to the substantive law: a drugged intent is still an intent. No doubt the circumstances of the offence called for some mitigation of sentence. However, given that the respondent had mens rea and no supervening defence was available, D's conviction was inevitable.
Supervening detences are capable of exculpating when the prima facie offence is proved. The core intoxication doctrines do not do that...
The core intoxication doctrines are inculpatory, not excusatory. They give the prosecution an alternative route to establish the mens rea requirement. If the doctrinal elements are satisfied, the law will deem D to have mens rea—a legal fiction. As such, the intoxication rules aid the prosecution, not the defendant. Where they apply, they relieve the prosecution of the need to prove that D actually had mens rea. It follows that those rules are not, in terms of substantive law, a defence...
Section 321 requires proof of intention or knowledge of likelihood. How does the intoxication doctrine allow the courts to dispense with this explicit requirement? The primary work, it is submitted, is done by s. 85(1) in the Singaporean Penal Code: "Except as provided in this section and in section 86, intoxication shall not constitute a defence to any criminal criminal charge"...
In terms of substantive legal doctrine, neither alibi nor intoxication is a defence. They do not supervene to generate an acquittal despite proof of the actus reus and mens rea elements of an offence. In the case of intoxication, indeed, it is quite the opposite. The fact of intoxication generates a denial of mens rea, but the legal doctrine is inculpatory...
That said, there are two situations where s. 85(2) can potentially operate as a true supervening defence, preventing conviction even though D does in fact have mens rea. Recall the terms of s. 85(2):
(2) Intoxication shall be a defence to any criminal charge if by reason thereof the person charged at the time of the act or omission complained of did not know that such act or omission was wrong or did not know what he was doing and—
(a) the state of intoxication was caused without his consent by the malicious or negligent act of another person; or
(b) the person charged was, by reason of intoxication, insane, temporarily or otherwise, at the time of such act or omission.
Under this subsection, intoxication is available as a defence under certain circumstances if D did the actus reus when he "did not know that such act or omission was wrong or did not know what he was doing". Normally, if D "did not know what he was doing", he would lack mens rea. However, it is possible for D to have mens rea, yet fall within the scope of s. 85(2), when he does not know that his conduct is wrong. In that event, D will be entitled to a supervening defence if either the intoxication is 'involuntary' under paragraph (a), i.e. "caused without his consent by the malicious or negligent act of another person"; or if, under paragraph (b), D is, "by reason of intoxication, insane, temporarily or otherwise, at the time", in which case D falls to be dealt with as if he were of unsound mind.
Such scenarios are likely to be rare in the extreme. In practice, the only kinds of cases where D might advertently do the actus reus, yet be entitled to a supervening defence of intoxication, are those where the intoxication triggers a condition analogous to insanity...
Because intoxication is so often said to be a defence, it comes as no surprise that the courts have ruled that the burden of proving its application falls on the defendant...
Not every common law jurisdiction has special intoxication rules, and it is an open question whether such special rules, with all their complexity and confusion, are really needed. In a typical drunken assault, the defendant is hardly an automaton. He is severely disinhibited and, no doubt, his chosen course of conduct is influenced by the alcohol (or other substances) he has taken. But he still intends to hit someone...
There seem to be very few cases where drunken violence occurs without mens rea, and it is arguable that the confusion caused by the intoxication rules is not worth the true value they deliver...
Writers and judges are sometimes exercised by their concern to argue that (voluntary) intoxication should never excuse wrongdoing. This worry misses the fact that, so far as the core intoxication doctrines are concerned, it does not. However, to see this, we must start from the basic principles of criminal law, and not lose sight of them. Actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea nowadays means that, before convicting, the court must be satisfied that the defendant fulfilled both actus reus and mens rea elements of the offence charged.
Centuries ago, the common law regarded the absence of mens rea as an excuse. It no longer does so, and mens rea is now a fundamental positive requirement of criminal liability. Once we accept that foundational precept—as modern criminal law does—it becomes logically impossible for the core intoxication doctrines to be a supervening defence, whether under the original Indian Penal Code, its 1935 revision, or even at common law. The 'defence' is no more than an assertion that D lacked mens rea that the positive requirements of the offence have not been satisfied. The main function of our intoxication doctrines, both at common law and under ss. 85 86, is to secure D's conviction despite the fact that he does not fulfil the mens rea requirements specified for the offence. It enables the prosecution to override the statutory and common law requirement to prove the elements of the offence. This cannot serve a supervening defence function. And if the legislators ever thought otherwise, they were conceptually, necessarily, mistaken. But it seems more likely that they meant the language of defences in the same non-technical sense in which an alibi is a defence—not in terms of substantive legal doctrine"
First, consider a case under the Indian or Singaporean Penal Codes where the defendant does actually have mens rea. Suppose that D is (involuntarily) intoxicated. Someone has spiked his drink or his food. While in that condition, D attacks and injures V with intent to do so. Suppose further that D would not have acted as he did but for being intoxicated. None the less, in such a case, D straightforwardly commits the offence of voluntarily causing hurt. He satisfies the actus reus and mens rea of the offence...
In R v. Kingston, D went to P's flat by invitation to discuss a business proposition. Once there, he was given coffee that P had deliberately laced with drugs. D was then led by P to a bedroom where a young boy, also drugged, lay unconscious on the bed. D indecently assaulted the boy. P filmed the activity and subsequently sought to blackmail D. When the matter came to light, D was charged with indecent assault. His conviction was upheld by the House of Lords on the basis that D had mens rea at the time. D was aware of what he was doing; his claim was only that, but for being surreptitiously drugged, he would not have acted as he did. On these facts, intoxication was held to be irrelevant to the substantive law: a drugged intent is still an intent. No doubt the circumstances of the offence called for some mitigation of sentence. However, given that the respondent had mens rea and no supervening defence was available, D's conviction was inevitable.
Supervening detences are capable of exculpating when the prima facie offence is proved. The core intoxication doctrines do not do that...
The core intoxication doctrines are inculpatory, not excusatory. They give the prosecution an alternative route to establish the mens rea requirement. If the doctrinal elements are satisfied, the law will deem D to have mens rea—a legal fiction. As such, the intoxication rules aid the prosecution, not the defendant. Where they apply, they relieve the prosecution of the need to prove that D actually had mens rea. It follows that those rules are not, in terms of substantive law, a defence...
Section 321 requires proof of intention or knowledge of likelihood. How does the intoxication doctrine allow the courts to dispense with this explicit requirement? The primary work, it is submitted, is done by s. 85(1) in the Singaporean Penal Code: "Except as provided in this section and in section 86, intoxication shall not constitute a defence to any criminal criminal charge"...
In terms of substantive legal doctrine, neither alibi nor intoxication is a defence. They do not supervene to generate an acquittal despite proof of the actus reus and mens rea elements of an offence. In the case of intoxication, indeed, it is quite the opposite. The fact of intoxication generates a denial of mens rea, but the legal doctrine is inculpatory...
That said, there are two situations where s. 85(2) can potentially operate as a true supervening defence, preventing conviction even though D does in fact have mens rea. Recall the terms of s. 85(2):
(2) Intoxication shall be a defence to any criminal charge if by reason thereof the person charged at the time of the act or omission complained of did not know that such act or omission was wrong or did not know what he was doing and—
(a) the state of intoxication was caused without his consent by the malicious or negligent act of another person; or
(b) the person charged was, by reason of intoxication, insane, temporarily or otherwise, at the time of such act or omission.
Under this subsection, intoxication is available as a defence under certain circumstances if D did the actus reus when he "did not know that such act or omission was wrong or did not know what he was doing". Normally, if D "did not know what he was doing", he would lack mens rea. However, it is possible for D to have mens rea, yet fall within the scope of s. 85(2), when he does not know that his conduct is wrong. In that event, D will be entitled to a supervening defence if either the intoxication is 'involuntary' under paragraph (a), i.e. "caused without his consent by the malicious or negligent act of another person"; or if, under paragraph (b), D is, "by reason of intoxication, insane, temporarily or otherwise, at the time", in which case D falls to be dealt with as if he were of unsound mind.
Such scenarios are likely to be rare in the extreme. In practice, the only kinds of cases where D might advertently do the actus reus, yet be entitled to a supervening defence of intoxication, are those where the intoxication triggers a condition analogous to insanity...
Because intoxication is so often said to be a defence, it comes as no surprise that the courts have ruled that the burden of proving its application falls on the defendant...
Not every common law jurisdiction has special intoxication rules, and it is an open question whether such special rules, with all their complexity and confusion, are really needed. In a typical drunken assault, the defendant is hardly an automaton. He is severely disinhibited and, no doubt, his chosen course of conduct is influenced by the alcohol (or other substances) he has taken. But he still intends to hit someone...
There seem to be very few cases where drunken violence occurs without mens rea, and it is arguable that the confusion caused by the intoxication rules is not worth the true value they deliver...
Writers and judges are sometimes exercised by their concern to argue that (voluntary) intoxication should never excuse wrongdoing. This worry misses the fact that, so far as the core intoxication doctrines are concerned, it does not. However, to see this, we must start from the basic principles of criminal law, and not lose sight of them. Actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea nowadays means that, before convicting, the court must be satisfied that the defendant fulfilled both actus reus and mens rea elements of the offence charged.
Centuries ago, the common law regarded the absence of mens rea as an excuse. It no longer does so, and mens rea is now a fundamental positive requirement of criminal liability. Once we accept that foundational precept—as modern criminal law does—it becomes logically impossible for the core intoxication doctrines to be a supervening defence, whether under the original Indian Penal Code, its 1935 revision, or even at common law. The 'defence' is no more than an assertion that D lacked mens rea that the positive requirements of the offence have not been satisfied. The main function of our intoxication doctrines, both at common law and under ss. 85 86, is to secure D's conviction despite the fact that he does not fulfil the mens rea requirements specified for the offence. It enables the prosecution to override the statutory and common law requirement to prove the elements of the offence. This cannot serve a supervening defence function. And if the legislators ever thought otherwise, they were conceptually, necessarily, mistaken. But it seems more likely that they meant the language of defences in the same non-technical sense in which an alibi is a defence—not in terms of substantive legal doctrine"
--- GETTING DRUNK IN SINGAPORE AND MALAYSIA / A. P. Simester in Singapore Journal of Legal Studies (July 2012)
