The Court of Appeal has dismissed Alan Cawley’s appeal against his convictions for the murders of brothers John (Jack) Blaine and Thomas Blaine, finding no error in the trial judge’s directions to the jury on diminished responsibility.
Cawley was convicted on 25 July 2017 of murdering the brothers in Castlebar on 10 July 2013. At trial, he admitted unlawfully killing them but argued that a mental disorder had substantially diminished his responsibility, making him guilty of manslaughter rather than murder. The appeal concerned the jury charge on that partial defence, particularly how it addressed intoxication and the burden of proof.
The Court of Appeal said Cawley bore the burden of establishing diminished responsibility on the balance of probabilities. The court rejected his argument that the prosecution had to prove beyond reasonable doubt that he was intoxicated, where intoxication was raised in considering whether a mental disorder substantially diminished his responsibility.
The jury heard evidence from two psychiatrists. They agreed that Cawley had emotionally unstable and dissociative personality disorders, but disagreed about whether those conditions qualified as mental disorders under the Criminal Law (Insanity) Act 2006. The defence psychiatrist also diagnosed attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. The prosecution psychiatrist considered Cawley intoxicated at the time of the killings and said intoxication led to extremely impulsive and violent behaviour. The defence psychiatrist considered that the disorders contributed to his actions and agreed with an earlier assessment that alcohol alone did not explain what happened.
The court noted that the trial judge told the jury intoxication was excluded from the statutory definition of mental disorder and that the defence had to prove the relevant disorder substantially diminished Cawley’s responsibility. When jurors later asked who bore the burden, the judge repeated that it rested on the defence and that the standard was the balance of probabilities. The Court of Appeal considered that answer appropriate.
The court also distinguished the case from the English decision in R v Dietschmann, cautioning that the statutory definitions differ. It said the evidence here did not support the possibility that intoxication and a mental disorder both contributed to the relevant impairment: the evidence presented those explanations as alternatives. The court concluded that the jury had been told clearly what it had to decide and dismissed the appeal. The judgment did not alter the trial convictions.