Duress excuses a defendant who offends under threat of death or serious injury — a complete defence, but one hedged with strict conditions and notable exclusions.
A defendant who admits the offence can still walk free if the will was overborne by a sufficiently grave threat, which is why the courts police this defence so tightly. This chapter starts with the scope of the defence and its limits — the offences for which it is unavailable, the absolute bar for murder, and where the burden of proof lies — before setting out the two-stage test at its core. It then works through what the threat itself must look like: death or serious injury rather than financial pressure, the people at whom it may be directed, and the effect of a reasonable but mistaken belief, together with the demands of immediacy, causation and the absence of any reasonable alternative such as police protection. It closes with the objective stage and which of the defendant's characteristics count, when voluntary association with criminals bars the defence, and how duress by threats is distinguished from duress of circumstances and self-defence.
