Sinanovic v the Queen S260/2000

The High Court of Australia heard an appeal from the Supreme Court of Victoria in *Sinanovic v the Queen*. The appellant, Mr Sinanovic, had been convicted of murder and appealed his conviction.

The central legal issue before the High Court was whether the trial judge had erred in law by failing to direct the jury adequately on the defence of provocation. Specifically, the court considered whether the judge's summing up had sufficiently explained the objective elements of provocation, namely whether the provocation was such as to make an ordinary person act as the accused did, and whether the jury had been properly instructed on the subjective element, that is, whether the accused had in fact been provoked.

McHugh and Callinan JJ, in a joint judgment, found that the trial judge's directions on provocation were inadequate. They held that the judge had not sufficiently explained the objective test, which requires the jury to consider whether an ordinary person, in the circumstances in which the accused found themselves, might have reacted in the same way. The court emphasised that the jury must be instructed that the question is not whether the accused *was* provoked, but whether the provocation was *enough* to make an ordinary person lose self-control. The appeal was allowed, and the conviction was quashed.