Smith, Josephine

Josephine Smith was convicted in November 1993 of murder and received a sentence of life imprisonment.

The CCRC received an application for review of the conviction in December 1998.

Ms Smith had been convicted of the murder of her husband.

At trial, Ms Smith’s defence had been run on the basis of diminished responsibility with experts providing evidence that Ms Smith suffered from psychiatric vulnerabilities.

Subsequent to Ms Smith’s conviction, the House of Lords ruled in the case of R v Morgan Smith (2000) that convicted persons who had argued diminished responsibility unsuccessfully could raise substantially the same evidence in support of a defence of provocation.

In light of the judgment in Morgan Smith, the jury at Ms Smith’s trial were misdirected in relation to provocation.

In particular, they were not invited to take account of any of Ms Smith’s “personal characteristics” that might be relevant to a provocation defence.

The CCRC referred the conviction in December 2001.

The Court of Appeal quashed the conviction in November 2002 and substituted it for a conviction for manslaughter.