The Mushrooms and the Stranger's House

At a house party the Accused drank alcohol and ate magic mushrooms. Psilocybin, the drug in the mushrooms, can cause hallucinations. He lost his grip on reality and left the house. He was not simply drunk or high: the expert evidence was that he was in a psychotic state, capable of moving but with no willed control over what he did. He broke into the nearby home of a stranger and attacked the occupant, causing permanent injuries. He then broke into a second house, whose occupants called the police. He was charged with breaking and entering and committing aggravated assault, and with breaking and entering and committing mischief over $5,000. At trial he argued that he was not guilty because his actions were involuntary, the result of extreme intoxication akin to automatism. The Crown relied on s. 33.1 of the Criminal Code, enacted after R v Daviault, which took that defence away for violent offences whenever the intoxication was self-induced. The Accused said s. 33.1 was unconstitutional because it lets the state convict a person of a violent crime without proving either a voluntary act or a guilty mind.