Rick Sanchez is an interdimensional traveller, an avid alcoholic, and grandfather to Morty. On his space escapades, he’s often seen getting in trouble with the law and other aliens. Putting aside the obvious jurisdictional issues - space doesn’t count, sorry folks - would Rick be able to use the defence of involuntary intoxication if he were to get caught?
Let’s imagine that Rick & Morty are seen using the pickle ray on their neighbours. A pickle ray is quite self-explanatory: a ray that turns others into pickles. They get arrested. Morty decides to get his own legal counsel and Rick asks us whether he can use this defence. We say we’ll look into it and do some research. Our findings lead us to the following information: Involuntary intoxication is an available defence under section 33.1 of the Criminal Code, RSC,1985, c 46. However, if the three conditions below are met then it is not a defence that the accused lacked the general intent or voluntariness required to commit that offence:
The following factors listed may also cause a defence of involuntary intoxication to fail, if the court finds:
We must now look at the facts. Rick is drunk on all of his adventures satisfying the first condition of self-inducement and second condition for intoxication. Unfortunately, by turning his neighbours into pickles he also “departs” from the standard of reasonable care thereby satisfying the third condition as well (fortunately for us, there’s not a lot of people out there using pickle rays). Rick may also face some hurdles when it comes to intoxication being caused “by some degree of fault” on his part and the fact that he “ought reasonably to have known” that vodka is an intoxicant. Rick was also with a minor when committing the act which doesn’t make his case look any better. Safe to say that Rick would most likely not be able to use involuntary intoxication as a defence in Canadian courts. However, given that he’s a genius and the proud owner of a portal gun, a gadget that allows the user to travel between different universes/dimensions, I wouldn’t worry too much about him.
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“It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.” ~ Bilbo Baggins
The world is a dangerous place but not like the ones you see in the movies; last I checked, there are no Nazgul or dragons outside my door. However, we can learn a lot from the hobbits and their resilience to accomplish a meaningful purpose. Much like Tolkien’s realm, the criminal law landscape has a variety of environments such as the types of charges, clients, and even self-growth that one will inevitably encounter. For myself, Frodo’s character is very familiar in that he was initially wracked with fear and doubt about the obstacles he was going to face. Yet despite his background, he proves himself to be one of the greatest heroes in the trilogy. Though I will never encounter the decision to throw an evil ring into a fiery pit, I will be facing my own obstacles in the form of a steep learning curve. When I first entered law school, I was swept by the idea of wanting to do civil law and entertaining dreams of entering into insurance law, a familiar subject that was a comfortable fallback. Rather, like Frodo I discovered that by staying in the Shire, or in my case an area of comfortability, I would not satisfy the journey calling me to do criminal law. In my last year as a law student, I chose to pursue my articles with Guillaume, a well-distinguished, kind, and knowledgeable lawyer. I hope that I am able to learn from this journey just as Frodo learned from Gandalf and the fellowship around him. As I start this journey, I know that there will be ups and downs in my learning but I will not let that stop me from doing my best as an articling student. And so, as I begin this journey I start hopeful and ready to encounter anything that comes my way outside of the Shire. |
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