For a person to be found guilty of gross negligence manslaughter the prosecution has to prove that he - or she - owed a duty
of care to the victim and negligently breached it.
It also must be proved that it could be foreseen the breach would give rise to an obvious risk of death, that it caused the death
and - most challenging of all - that the circumstances of the breach were so reprehensible as to justify the conclusion that it
amounted to gross negligence and required criminal sanction.
That sets the bar very high for the prosecution.
The defendant's conduct must fall so far below the standard to be expected of a reasonably competent and careful person in
the defendant's position, that it was something truly, exceptionally bad. |