Monthly News Archives: February 2014
5 February 2014 by Rosalind English
Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority v First-Tier Tribunal (Social Entitlement Chamber) [2014] EWCA Civ 65, 3 February 2014 – read judgment
When considering whether to award compensation under the Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme, the board must rest its determination of “crime of violence” on the act causing the injury, not its consequences. A breach of the provisions of the Dangerous Dogs Act is not necessarily a “crime of violence”.
Background facts
In August 2002 a fourteen year old boy, TS, was riding his bicycle along the pavement of a quiet residential street near his home when a small dog, which had escaped from its owner’s garden, rushed up to him barking in an aggressive manner. TS instinctively swerved away from the dog on to the road and into the path of a car. He was seriously injured. He spent four months in hospital and is now quite severely disabled.
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4 February 2014 by Guest Contributor
The business of the law can tend to harden the heart – but every now and then a case comes along that drives off the spectre of compassion fatigue. This was the effect of a recent libel claim in which I obtained substantial damages and published apologies for a 20-year-old Afghan refugee, Abdul Shizad, who – despite being entirely alone in the UK and having limited English – had the courage to sue the Daily Express, which had falsely accused him of being a “Taliban Suspect”.
The Express’s timing was particularly superlative, its 4 March 2013 article “Now Judges Let Taliban Suspect Stay” coming just a month after Abdul had succeeded in a stressful and exhausting 4 year quest for asylum in the UK.
Accompanied by a most unflattering photograph of two unsuspecting “Judges”, the article lambasted “a new human rights scandal” in which “judges have said a suspected Taliban member can stay in Britain”.
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3 February 2014 by Rosalind English
Shahid v The Scottish Ministers [2014] ScotCS CSIH – 18 – read judgment
Solitary confinement of a dangerous prisoner in accordance with the prison rules was neither unlawful nor in breach of his Convention rights, the Scottish Court of Session has ruled.
The petitioner (as we shall call him to avoid confusion, rather than the more accurate “reclaimer”) was serving a life sentence for what the court described as a “brutal and sadistic” racially motivated murder of a 15 year old white boy in 2006. Apart from a short period during his trial he remained continuously segregated until 13 August 2010, when he was allowed once again to associate with other prisoners (“mainstream”). He claimed that his segregation was contrary to the Prisons and Young Offenders Institutions (Scotland) Rules 2006 and, separately, contrary to Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which provides protection against torture and cruel and unusual punishments, and Article 8, which protects the right to private life. He sought declarations to that effect and £6,000 by way of damages.
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2 February 2014 by Sarina Kidd
Welcome back to the UK Human Rights Roundup, your regular all-singing, all-dancing extravaganza of human rights news and views. The full list of links can be found here. You can find previous roundups here. Links compiled by Adam Wagner, post by Sarina Kidd.
This week, a group of MPs investigating drones were advised that large amounts of GCHQ surveillance is likely to be illegal, and the Conservatives continued their push for a Bill of Rights. Meanwhile, the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights argued that anti-Semitism is alive and well in Europe.
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1 February 2014 by Rosalind English
Government of the Republic of South Africa v Dewani [2014] EWHC 153 (Admin) 31 January 2014 – read judgment
Shrien Dewani, the British man facing charges of murdering his wife on honeymoon in South Africa, has lost his appeal to block extradition there (so far three men have been convicted in South Africa over Mrs Dewani’s death). The Court ruled that it would not be “unjust and oppressive” to extradite him, on condition that the South African government agreed to return him to the UK after one year if his depressive illness and mental health problems still prevented a trial from taking place.
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Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority v First-Tier Tribunal (Social Entitlement Chamber) [2014] EWCA Civ 65, 3 February 2014 – read judgment
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