Amber Marks has written an article for the Criminal Law Review looking at the efficacies of the current legislation around spiking.
Numerous campaigns have been launched to address perceived shortcomings in the criminal justice system's response to victims of spiking, culminating in a Home Affairs Committee Inquiry which said that more needed to be done and a Home Office Report which agreed, but said that it had been unable to identify any gap in the law which would be addressed with a new offence.
In this month’s edition of the Criminal Law Review, Amber Marks, Lecturer in Criminal Law and Evidence at Queen Mary University of London, reveals several gaps in the criminal law on spiking, including ambiguity regarding the circumstances in which it is an offence to spike someone with alcohol, and the challenge of proving that the spiker intended to harm or annoy the person spiked. “It shouldn’t matter what the person’s objective in spiking someone is. Even if they just do it for a laugh, the same offence is caused. Even if the spiker thinks that the person will end up enjoying the effects, or will benefit from them, it is not their choice to make.” Amber thinks that the offence should hinge on consent.
In her article she thanks the “exceptionally bright” students in her Law and Pharmacology seminars in 2022-23 or helping her to appreciate the importance of the topic to young people today.
Amber hopes that lawmakers will be in a better position to satisfactorily address deficiencies in the law as a result of her research findings.
Read the full article in the Criminal Law Review (subscription required).