Law Weblog

Lotto rapist: statutory interpretation and precedent

Thursday 31 January 2008 at 11:15 pm | In News | Post Comment

A v Hoare [2008] HL
[Statutory interpretation – intention of Parliament – precedent use of Practice Statement]
D, known as the Lotto rapist (convicted of several sexual assaults, including rape) attempted to rape V in 1989. He was given a life sentence. At that time, he was not worth suing for damages. In 2004, on day release from prison he bought a lottery ticket and won £7 million. So in 2005, V sued for personal injury, but the claim was rejected by the High Court because her claim had been brought after the six-year limit imposed by the Limitation Act 1980.

Held: A compensation claim against D could go to the High Court for hearing.

The Limitation Act 1980 requires a claimant to bring an action against her assailant for injury within 6 years.

However, Parliament could not have intended to exclude those who had been intentionally injured. Otherwise anomalies would arise such as S v W (child abuse: damages) [1995], in which it was held that a claimant suing out of time was able to pursue a claim against her mother for failing to protect her against sexual abuse by her father, but not a claim against the father himself.

The lower courts considered themselves bound by Stubbings v Webb [1993] HL in which it was held that the flexibility provided for elsewhere in the Act did not apply to a case of deliberate assault, including acts of indecent assault.

The claimant contended that Stubbings v Webb had been wrongly decided and that the House should depart from it. She relied, inter alia, on the Law Commission’s report (Law Com No 270) which recommended a uniform regime for personal injuries, whether the claim was made in negligence or trespass to the person.

Courts had a discretion under s 33 of the Act to extend the time in the claimants’ favour.
Time ran from when the claimant knew of the injury, which was both a subjective and objective test not whether the claimant considered it serious enough to justify proceedings but whether she would ‘reasonably’ have done so. Once it had been ascertained what the claimant knew and what she should be treated as having known, the actual claimant dropped out of the picture.

Stubbings v Webb [1993] HL overruled; Letang v Cooper [1964] approved.
KR v Bryn Alyn Community (Holdings) Ltd (in liq) [2003] All ER (D) 101 (Jun) disapproved.

Claimant won