Compensation for Injury or Loss
| Date | 01 January 1965 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002201836502900112 |
| Published date | 01 January 1965 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Compensation for Injury or
Loss
PRI MI T IVE law, lex talionis, embodied in the phrase
"An
eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth", was harsh and led to the
blood feud
and
self help. Early it was recognised that the
courts
must
modify this form of retaliation and so appeared
the
doctrine
that
the
victim of a wrong might if he wished
accept compensation.
The
acceptance of compensation was
later made compulsory except for certain wrong doings
regarded as offences against
the
community which deserved
punishment. Civil wrongs thus became separated from crime
and in the main compensation ceased to be a matter of concern
for
the
criminal courts for the victim was supposed to have his
remedy in the civil courts.
The
origin of
the
present-day
fine may have been restitution,
but
fines are claimed by the
state and do
not
compensate the victim for his injury or loss.
It is the function of the criminal courts to punish the
wrong doer and in modern times deterrence and reformation
as opposed to retribution have been looked
upon
as the legiti-
mate ends of punishment. Quite recently, however, there has
been aslight change of emphasis or perhaps it is more correct
to say reappraisal of the obligations of the state towards
the
victims of crime.
The
recent increase in crimes of violence,
hooliganism, and vandalism has focused attention on
the
injury or loss caused to the victims of unwarranted outrages.
In the White Paper, Penal Practice in a Changing Society
(Cmnd. 645), presented to Parliament in 1959, it was said,
"The
assumption that the claims of the victim are sufficiently
satisfied if the offender is punished by society becomes less
persuasive as society in its dealings with offenders increasingly
emphasises the reformative aspects of punishment. Indeed
in the public mind the interests of the offender may infre-
quently seem to be placed before those of his victim.
This
is
certainly
not
the
correct emphasis.
It
may well be
that
our
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