Attorney-General v. Tion

The respondent had drunken intercourse with the complainant. He claimed that he mistook the complainant for his wife in his drunken stupor. She also mistook the respondent to be her husband during the intercourse. After intercourse, she realized that the respondent was not her husband. The respondent also claimed that he did not know the complainant was not his wife until this moment. Consequently, the court acquitted the respondent of rape and criminal trespass. The lower court reasoned that the onus was on the prosecution to establish whether the respondent had done something to impersonate the complainant’s husband and concluded that there was no evidence to support a finding of impersonation with the intent to deceive. The Attorney-General appealed this decision. The appellate court remarked that the lower court’s conclusion that there was no evidence of impersonation was incorrect. Whereas the lower court was focused on the testimony of the complainant regarding her own state of mind, the proper analysis should have concerned the state of mind of the respondent. While the Court of Appeal was suspicious of the respondent’s account that his actions had been the result of a mistake, it still found that the trial judge “had the great advantage of seeing and hearing the witnesses,” and could have reasonably found the respondent’s testimony credible. Therefore, the lower court could have had “reasonable doubt” as to his guilt. Accordingly, the appeal was dismissed.