Police Law Blog European Decisions Statutory Materials

Police liability for failures in criminal investigations

Written by: Elliot Gold
Published: 22 February 2018

The hits for the police keep on coming. The decision in Commissioner of the Metropolis v (1) DSD (2) NBV [2018] UKSC 11 confirms that the police can be liable in proceedings for a breach of Article 3’s prohibition on inhuman and degrading treatment (and possibly Article 4’s prohibition on slavery) where they fail to perform an adequate criminal investigation into alleged serious ill-treatment.

This decision was less of a surprise than Robinson v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police [2018] UKSC 4 – given the strength of the earlier judgments both at first instance and in the Court of Appeal. That said, it is hard to say anything other than that the courts are slowly but surely eroding out of existence the police’s ‘immunity’ from claims arising out of the performance of its core duties.

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

Written by: Elliot Gold
Published: 4 July 2017

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.

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

Written by: Elliot Gold
Published: 4 July 2017

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.

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Limitation and the threshold for article 3/8 investigative claims

Written by: Cecily White
Published: 11 June 2017

Lavender J in MLIA & CLEL v Chief Constable of Hampshire [2017] EWHC 292 (QB) has offered helpful guidance on the application of the limitation defence for human rights claims, in a case which failed to meet the threshold for engaging the investigative duty under Articles 3 and 8 of the Convention.

The Claimants were a mother and daughter who had been victims of abusive, aggressive, violent and threatening behaviour perpetrated by the First Claimant’s former partner prior to November 2005. Following an order by Master McCloud that there should be a trial of liability, the issues before Lavender J were:

1. Whether the claim had been commenced within “such… period as the court… considers equitable having regard to all the circumstances” pursuant to section 7(5)(b) of the Human Rights Act 1998;

2. Whether Article 3 and/or Article 8 were engaged and, if so, whether the Defendant had acted in a manner which was incompatible with the duty imposed by those Articles, in particular by failing to investigate the Claimants’ allegations.

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