Odger's English Common Law

STATUTORY ASSAULTS. 321
an injury which is not a maim may yet be a disfigurement,
e.g., to cut off a man's nose. To " disable " means to cause
permanent disablement.
2. An assault committed with intent to rob is a statutory
felony punishable with penal servitude for five years. 1 On a
charge of robbery the prisoner can be convicted of this offence.
But a prisoner charged with this offence cannot be convicted
of a common assault.
3. To unlawfully and maliciously wound, or to inflict, either
with or without any weapon, any grievous bodily harm
upon, any other person is a misdemeanour punishable with
penal servitude for five years. 2 Any incision, which pierces
both skins of the victim's body, is a "wound;" we have
already defined " grievous bodily harm." On an indictment
under this section it is not necessary for the prosecution
to prove any special intent as it is in cases of felony under
section 18 above. But the jury must find that the prisoner
acted unlawfully and maliciously. The word " maliciously "
has a very wide meaning. It is not necessary to prove that
the prisoner had any spite or ill-will against the person
injured or even that he intended to wound or inflict grievous
bodily harm on that particular person. He will be deemed
to have acted maliciously if he knew or ought to have known
that the act which he intended to do would injure any one.
Where a soldier, in striking at a man with a belt, accidentally wounded
a woman who was standing beside him, it was held that he was guilty of
unlawfully and maliciously wounding her. The facts that he had no
intention whatever of striking her, and had no reasonable cause to expect
that she would be struck, were held to be immaterial. 3
Where A. was out in a punt on a creek shooting wild fowl, and seeing
B. in pursuit of wild fowl on the same creek, fired in the direction of B.
with the intention merely of frightening him away, but owing to B.'s
punt suddenly slewing round he was seriously wounded, it was held that A.
was rightly convicted of unlawfully and maliciously wounding B., although
he had no intention whatever of doing him any bodily harm. 4
misdemeanour. This and an attempt to commit suicide are the only cases in which
a man can be convicted at common law of a misdemeanour committed upon
himself : Co. Litt. 127 a ; 1 Hawk. P. C, 7th ed., 626.
1 Larceny Act, 1916 (6 4; 7 Geo. V. c. 50), s. 23 (3) ; and see Kobbery, post, p. 331.
1
2 24 & 26 Vict. c. 100, s. 20. On an indictment under this section the prisoner can
be convicted of an assault : B. v. Taylor (1869), L. R. 1 C. 0. R. 194. Seethe
indictment in the Appendix, No. 32.
3 B. v. Latimer (1886), 17 Q. B. D. 859.
* S. v. Ward (1872), L. R. 1 C. C. R. 356.
B.C.L. 21