Miller v The Queen

The High Court of Australia considered appeals from convictions for murder arising from a violent altercation where the victim was fatally stabbed by a fourth man, with the appellants and this fourth man being tried together. The central dispute concerned whether the appellants could be held liable for murder on the basis of an extended joint criminal enterprise.

The legal issues before the High Court included whether liability for murder on the basis of an extended joint criminal enterprise should have been left to the jury, and whether such a basis was a proper foundation for a murder conviction. The Court also considered whether the doctrine of extended joint criminal enterprise, as established in *McAuliffe v The Queen*, should be confined or abandoned in light of overseas jurisprudence, and whether *McAuliffe* should be reopened and overruled. The sufficiency of the evidence, particularly in light of the appellants' intoxication, was also a point of contention.

The Court affirmed the principles established in *McAuliffe* and *Gillard*, emphasising that while accessorial responsibility is based on an intentional contribution to a crime, the criminal responsibility of a participant in a joint criminal enterprise is grounded in the authorisation of a crime incidental to that enterprise. The Court reasoned that deliberate participation in a joint criminal enterprise, with knowledge of the foreseen risk of an incidental crime, bears upon individual moral culpability. Participants in such an enterprise are not merely accessories but are, in essence, partners in crime, each authorising acts foreseen as possible incidents of the enterprise. The Court noted that the agreement to participate in a joint criminal enterprise, though it may be inferred, must be proved beyond reasonable doubt.

The appeals were allowed, the orders of the Court of Criminal Appeal of the Supreme Court of South Australia were set aside, and the matters were remitted to the Court of Criminal Appeal for determination.