Police Law Blog European Decisions Statutory Materials

Abuse of process – boiling down to a fair trial

A very long judgment in Marsh v MoJ [2017] EWHC 1040 (QB) deals with a employee’s personal injury claim arising from his employer’s misconduct investigation into him. The final part, however, addressed (very briefly) an abuse of process application, where it was contended that the Defendant’s solicitor acted with an excess of zeal when dealing with witnesses and/or that she was too close to the case.

Disabled person left in police car for 12 hours a breach of Article 3, €3,000 damages

This is the first of two posts on the case from the European Court of Human Rights, Shalyavski v Bulgaria [2017] ECHR 564; (App no. 67608/11) 15.6.17, concerning breaches of Articles 3 and 8. This first one concerns damages for (arguably) detention contrary to Article 3. Where a disabled person, unable to mobilise himself, was kept by the police in a car for between eleven and twelve hours as a result of the arrest of his carer, this amounted to a breach of Article 3. Monetary damages were awarded but were typically modest.

Arrest for breach of a behaviour injunction (which isn’t)

The courts have given another judgment, Ahmed v Crown Prosecution Service [2017] EWHC 1272 (Admin), which helps the police in considering what actions fall within the execution of their duty. In short, where a police officer genuinely and reasonably believes that they are authorised by a court order to arrest a person for breach of an injunction and that the person is in breach of it, they will be acting in the course of their duty if they arrest that person. Even where there is no valid injunction. Sort of. The case is not available on Bailii – possibly because it was given ex tempore. It is on Lawtel and Westlaw.

Winning Advocacy in the Employment Tribunal

The David Hare screenplay for the recent film Denial contains the following advice to the client: ‘stay seated, button your lip, and win.’ This article seeks to plot a path for advocates to winning in large scale discrimination claims in the employment tribunal, based on the writer’s long experience of the ET and, more recently, briefs to act for the respondents in two high stakes cases, AB v A Chief Constable[1]and Aubrey v The Chief Constable of Northumbria Police[2]. The suggested lessons apply to all types of large-scale claim in the ET.