Facts: A vicar wrote with a felt-tip pen on a pillar near the Houses of Parliament. He argued he was seeking to prevent the first Iraq war and therefore relied on section 3 of the Criminal Law Act 1967.

Held: Because the writing did not involve the use of force it was held that the defence could not be relied upon.

Facts: The defendant picked up a prostitute. He took her to some woods in his car, but decided not to go through with the transaction. He asked her to get out of the car, but she refused. He forced her out of the car and then sought to rely on self-defence in response to a charge of assault.

Held: He failed because he was not protecting his property from a risk of harm and the Court of Appeal rejected an analogy with a householder defending their house from a burglar.

Facts: Peter Hitchens was chrged with an assault on Kathleen Brown. His defence was that he acted in self-defence, in that he assaulted her in order to prevent her allowing a man into her flat, who Hitchens believed would assault him.

Held: The judge ruled that a defendant could not rely on self-defence in a case where the assault was against an innocent person in order to prevent an attack against a third party.

Held: A crime committed in an attempt to stop the Iraq war could not be justified on the basis of self-defence because the act of going to war was not an offence under English law. An offence under international law was insufficient.

Facts: After a night visiting pubs Daniel Keane was being given a ligt home by the victim and two women. Keane started to insult one of the women, including calling her a 'chav'. This led to a fight between Keane and the victim in which the victim suffered grievous bodily harm.

Held: At first instance Keane was convicted of grievous bodily harm. He appealed. The appeal was dismissed. Where the defendant was the aggressor or deliberately provokes the victim into punching him, there is no guaranteed right to rely on self-defence.

Facts: Tony Martin lived alone on an isolated farm called Bleak House. The farm and surrounding buildings were dilapidated and appeared to be derelict. Consequently the farm was subject to numerous break-ins. On the night of Aug 20th 1999 Freddie Barras (aged 16) and Brendan Fearon (aged 30) broke into the farm. Tony Martin armed with a 12 bore shot gun went downstairs and fired indiscriminately at where he thought the disturbance came from. He shot both the intruders killing Barras by a gunshot wound to the back. At his trial his plea of self defence was rejected by the jury and he was convicted of murder. He appealed on the grounds that his personality disorder should be taken into account in assessing whether he had used reasonable force for the purposes of self defence.

Held: Whilst the personality disorder could not be considered for the purposes of self defence, it did amount to an abnormality of the mind which substantially impaired his mental responsibility for the killing. Since the psychiatric reports had not been considered by the jury his conviction for murder was quashed.