Brown

May a person consent to an assault? Brown [1993] 2 All ER 75 House of Lords In Brown’s case , the House of Lords were split on the issue of whether the consent of victims could be defence to a charge of assault. The 3:2 majority based their judgment on the general rule that a victim cannot consent to an assault occasioning actual bodily harm or more, unless the defendant’s actions were within lawfully recognised exceptions. This decision …

…is in the public interest to do so. This is according to the majority judgment in Brown’s case. The problem with this clear-cut version of Brown is the ambiguous concept of ‘policy and public interest’. The balance between one’s privacy and protection from violence has not yet been clarified. However, indications of expansion in this area of law give us hope for a more coherent judicial approach to similar cases when they arise.