How did Derek Bentleys death change the law?
Answers
Answer:
Derek Bentley (30 June 1933 – 28 January 1953) was an English man who was hanged for the murder of a policeman, whose death occurred in the course of a burglary attempt. At the time, Christopher Craig, then aged 16, a friend and accomplice of Bentley, was accused of the murder.
Bentley was convicted as a party to murder, by the English law principle of common purpose, "joint enterprise". The jury at the trial found Bentley guilty based on the prosecution's interpretation of the ambiguous phrase "Let him have it" (Bentley's alleged exhortation to Craig), after the judge, Lord Chief Justice Goddard, had described Bentley as "mentally aiding the murder of Police Constable Sidney Miles". Goddard sentenced Bentley to be hanged: at the time, no other sentence was possible because of the conditions of the crime.
The Bentley case became a cause célèbre and led to a 45-year-long campaign to win Derek Bentley a posthumous pardon, which was granted in 1993, and then a further campaign for the quashing of his murder conviction, which occurred in 1998.
Explanation: