  One account of the offence/defence distinction is procedural. Offence elements must be proved if conviction is to be the legally correct verdict of the court. So if absence of consent is an offence-element—as it is in the offences created, in England and Wales, by the Sexual Offences Act 2003—it must be proved that consent was absent or \(D\) must be acquitted. The same is not true of defence elements, like those that make up the defence of duress. For a conviction to be correctly entered, it need not be proved that \(D\) did not act under duress. It is enough that there is no evidence that \(D\) acted under duress. The same is true where consent is a defence-element—as it is in the offences created, in England and Wales, by the Offences Against the Person Act 1861. If \(D\) punches \(V\) and is charged with assault occasioning actual bodily harm, the court need not be convinced that \(V\) did not consent. If the issue of consent never comes up, a conviction may still be the legally correct verdict of the court. Simply put, that \(D\) satisfied each offence element is something that must be proved. Whether \(D\) satisfied each defence element can remain uncertain. It is in this procedural distinction, on the view under consideration, that the offence/defence distinction consists (Duarte d’Almeida 2015).