If you do something or don't do something and it causes another person's death, you are responsible for their death. This is true even if the person was already sick or had an injury from something else, and your action just made their death happen sooner. You can still be held responsible for their death, even if they would have died anyway from their sickness or injury.
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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=DLM329307.
Every one who by any act or omission causes the death of another person kills that person, although the effect of the bodily injury caused to that person was merely to hasten his or her death while labouring under some disorder or disease arising from some other cause.
