He walked free from courtĪlasdair Padmore, aged 37, had been on insulin therapy for type 1 diabetes since he was five years old. The anti-social behaviour resulting from hypoglycaemia can take many forms – the two most common and publicly important are violence against individuals and driving whilst impaired. The legal implications may, however, be different depending on the cause.
This is true whether the hypoglycaemia is a consequence of treatment with insulin, or a sulphonylurea, or the result of an organic illness, such as insulinoma. Its ability to turn a normally caring, docile and socially responsible individual into an aggressive, socially irresponsible one 4, 5 is a well recognised though fortunately uncommon complication of hypoglycaemia. The fact that hypoglycaemia affects cognitive more than motor functions of the brain has been exploited in the courts throughout the world. I have drawn heavily on person experience by providing examples of where hypoglycaemia has figured largely or predominantly in deciding the outcome of a criminal or civil case in the UK. In this paper I shall deal briefly with each of these aspects of hypoglycaemia and refer the interested reader to more detailed studies where they exist. 2, 3 It may be invoked as a defence against a criminal charge or a civil action or offered in mitigation of a crime – in other words the perpetrator knew that what he/she was doing was wrong but was mentally impaired – though not to such an extent that he was a ‘non-person’ or automaton. Hypoglycaemia, whether insulin or sulphonylurea induced, may be accidental 1 or used as a weapon to kill or permanently damage someone.
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