(CRIMINAL REVISION)

SUDAN GOVERNMENT v. JOHN SHOUL WOUL

AC-CR-RE V-206-1966

Principles

·  Criminal Law—Smuggling—Customs Ordinance, ss. 203 and 208—MenS rca required Conviction under the Customs Ordinance, ss. 203 and 208 15 wrong if guilty mind (mens rea) is not proved.

Criminal Law—Smuggling—Customs Ordinance, ss. 203 and 208—MenS rca required Conviction under the Customs Ordinance, ss. 203 and 208 15 wrong if guilty mind (mens rea) is not proved.

Judgment

Hassan Abdel Rahim 1. August 14, 1966: —In my opinion accused is not guilty under the Customs Ordinance, ss. 203 and 208, and he is hereby set at liberty for the following reasons:

1. The prosecution failed to prove that accused either intentionally facilitated the smuggling of the recorder or knowingly suffered the car to be used in the smuggling of the recorder.

2. There is no guilty mind (mens rea). Accused was himself the victim of a trick by second accused. On the evidence before the court the recorder was placed in the office of accused when he was absent. I cannot understand how it can be said that accused abetted the smuggling of the recorder when he did not know that it was smuggled.

3. The general rule applicable to criminal cases is that the act alone does not make the doer of it guilty, unless it is done with a guilty mind. In this case it is a condition for criminal liability that accused knew that the recorder was smuggled. Such knowledge was not proved by the prosecution and so the conviction is wrong.

In this respect I refer to the statement of Lord Goddard C.J. in Harding

v. Price [1948] I K.B. 695/700 when he said” It is of the utmost importance for the protection of the liberty of the subject that a court should always bear in mind that unless a statute either clearly or by necessary implica tion rules out mens rca as a constituent part of a crime, the court should not find a man guilty of an offence against the criminal law unless he has a guilty mind.”

Editor’s Note. —But see Sudan Government V. Osman Salih & Sons and Others, HC-CP-REV-213-1959, (1959) S.L.J.R. 86. M. A. Imam J. held that the Customs Ordinance, s. 204 (h) is a section of absolute liability. No mens rer or intent is required.