Stingel v The Queen

This matter came before the High Court of Australia on an application for special leave to appeal. The applicant, Michael James Stingel, sought to challenge a decision of a lower court. The core of the dispute concerned the proper application of the legal test for provocation in criminal law, specifically the characteristics that should be attributed to the "reasonable man" or "ordinary person" when assessing whether an accused's reaction was one of provocation.

The legal issues before the High Court revolved around the interpretation of Lord Diplock's speech in *Camplin* and its subsequent application by courts. Specifically, the court was required to determine whether the "ordinary person" test for provocation should include characteristics of the accused beyond those that do not interfere with self-control, and if so, which characteristics are permissible to include. The argument presented suggested that some courts had adopted a broader interpretation of *Camplin*, allowing for the inclusion of unusual characteristics like exceptional excitability or pugnacity, which counsel for the applicant contended was inconsistent with Lord Diplock's original intent.

Counsel for the applicant argued that Lord Diplock's formulation in *Camplin* intended to confine the characteristics attributed to the ordinary person to those that do not impair self-control, and that the exclusion of characteristics such as excitability and pugnacity was central to this. The opposing view, as explored in the dialogue, suggested that if age could be taken into account, then other characteristics, such as limited mental capacity or race, might also logically be included, leading to a potential abandonment of the objective "ordinary person" test in favour of a subjective one. The court considered the difficulty in logically selecting which characteristics to include and exclude when applying the test.