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Miscarriages of Justice: Compensation

Document Cited authorities 4 Cited in Related
Vincent
Date01 October 2007
Published date01 October 2007
DOI10.1350/jcla.2007.71.5.402
Subject MatterHouse of Lords
JCL 71(5) dockie..House of Lords .. Page402 House of Lords
Miscarriages of Justice: Compensation
R (on the application of O’Brien) v Independent Assessor [2007] UKHL 10,
[2007] 2 WLR 544
This case arose following the payment of compensation to some of those
involved in the now notorious miscarriage of justice commonly referred
to as the case of the Bridgwater Four. In 1978 a young newspaper boy
was murdered when he interrupted a burglary which was in progress. In
1979 the two applicants then aged 25 and 17, and a co-defendant aged
45, were convicted of the murder and the aggravated burglary. Subse-
quently, serious irregularities came to light in the investigation into the
murder, and the prosecution accepted that the trial had been funda-
mentally flawed. In 1997 the two applicants were released and their
convictions in respect of those offences were quashed by the Court of
Appeal. They applied under s. 133 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 for
compensation for the miscarriage of justice.
When calculating the pecuniary loss suffered by the applicants, the
independent assessor considered what they would have earned if they
had been at liberty. Having made such a calculation, he considered that
to award them the whole of those sums would over-compensate them
because had they been at liberty they would have incurred personal
living expenses such as for food, clothing and accommodation which,
because they were in prison, they had not incurred. He deducted 25 per
cent from the calculation as to lost earnings to determine what the
applicants had actually lost. In calculating the applicants’ non-pecuniary
loss, the independent assessor made deductions of 25 per cent in the first
applicant’s case and 20 per cent in the second applicant’s case to take
account of their other convictions and any punishment resulting from
them, pursuant to s. 133(4A)(c) of the 1988 Act. The applicants sought
judicial review of the assessments in respect of their pecuniary loss on
the ground that it was unfair, unjust and contrary to public policy to
make a deduction from lost...

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