Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police [1991] UKHL 5.
So a claimant who develops a depression from living with a relative debilitated by the accident will not be able to recover damages. The law distinguishes between primary and secondary victims of psychiatric harm. The claimants were all people who suffered psychological harm as a result of witnessing the Hillsborough disaster. He defined shock as ‘the sudden appreciation by sight or sound of a horrifying event, which violently agitates the mind.’.
Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire [1992] 1 AC 310. Facts. Registered office: Venture House, Cross Street, Arnold, Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, NG5 7PJ. This case arose from the disaster that occurred at Hillsborough football stadium in Sheffield in the FA cup semi-final match between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest in 1989. NEGLIGENCE – PSYCHIATRIC DAMAGE – TRAUMATIC EVENT WITNESSED INDIRECTLY – DISTINCTION BETWEEN PRIMARY AND SECONDARY VICTIMS. Do you have a 2:1 degree or higher? Primary victims are: Any other person is a secondary victim.
Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire House of Lords. The House of Lords also indicated that the window of time constituting the ‘immediate aftermath’ of the event is very short. South Yorkshire Police had been responsible for crowd control at the football match and had been negligent in directing an excessively large number of … Facts. The case centred upon the liability of the police for the nervous shock suffered in consequence of the events of the Hillsborough disaster. A joined action was brought by Alcock (C) and several other claimants against the head of the South Yorkshire Police. The claimants sued the defendant (the employer of the police officers attending the event) in negligence. For a duty to be owed to protect a secondary victim from psychiatric harm, the following criteria must be met: Lord Keith of Kinkel stated that a close tie of love and affection is presumed between spouses and fiancées, and for parents towards their children. Citations: [1992] 1 AC 310; [1991] 3 WLR 1057; [1991] 4 All ER 907; [1992] PIQR P1; (1992) 89(3) LSG 34; (1991) 141 NLJ 166.
The House of Lords, in finding for D, held that, in cases of purely psychiatric damage caused by negligence, a distinction must be drawn between ‘primary’ and ‘secondary’ victims. He speculated where what was seen on television was equivalent to seeing it in person, the ‘unaided senses’ requirement could be dispensed with.
All claimed damages for the psychiatric harm they suffered as a result. In the Alcock case, 10 relatives of the deceased brought negligence claims in tort for psychiatric harm or nervous shock.
Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire. This requires close physical proximity to the event, and would usually exclude events witnessed by television or informed of by a third party, as was the case with some of the plaintiffs in. Some of the claimants witnessed events from other parts of the stadium.
The closer the tie between the claimant and the victim, the more likely it is that he would succeed in this element.
Free resources to assist you with your legal studies! 19th Jun 2019 The psychiatric harm must be caused by a sufficiently shocking event. Most had sustained psychiatric injuries after learning of the events by television or radio. Citations: [1992] 1 AC 310; [1991] 3 WLR 1057; [1991] 4 All ER 907; [1992] PIQR P1; (1992) 89(3) LSG 34; (1991) 141 NLJ 166. Of the claimants, most had not been present in the stadium at the time of the disaster and none had been in physical risk. Lord Ackner distinguished ‘sudden shock’ cases from those in which psychiatric illness is inflicted by the gradual stress of grief or having to look after an injured person. The House of Lords were called upon to determine whether, for the purposes of establishing liability in negligence, those who suffer purely psychiatric harm from witnessing an event at which they are not physically present are sufficiently proximate for a duty to be owed, and thus can be said to be reasonably within the contemplation of the tortfeasor.
The shock must be a "sudden" and not a "gradual" assault on the claimant's nervous system. Such persons must establish: Neither C nor the other claimants could meet these conditions, therefore the appeal was dismissed. This occurred at the Hillsborough Football Stadium, Sheffield during the FA Cup Semi-Final in which 96 spectators were killed and 450 injured in a human crush. The claimants were all people who suffered psychological harm as a result of witnessing the Hillsborough disaster. The disaster was broadcast on live television, where several claimants alleged they had witnessed friends and relatives die. We also have a number of samples, each written to a specific grade, to illustrate the work delivered by our academic services.
Some of the Lords made obiter statements indicating that the Alcock criteria could be departed from in some cases: These dicta has not been followed in any other case, however. He gave the example of a live broadcast filming close-up to an event where the accident unexpectedly occurs. Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police [1991] UKHL 5, [1992] 1 AC 310 is a leading English tort law case on liability for nervous shock (psychiatric injury). Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire – Case Summary. For all other relationships, it must be proven. C and the other claimants all had relatives who were caught up in the Hillsborough Stadium disaster, in which 95 fans of Liverpool FC died in a crush due, it was later established, to the negligence of the police in permitting too many supporters to crowd in one part of the stadium. Registered Data Controller No: Z1821391. Others were present in the stadium or had heard about the events in other ways.
They were friends, relatives and spouses of people who had died in the stampede when Hillsborough football stadium became dangerously overcrowded. The disaster was broadcast live on television and radio. [2] Although reform has been widely advocated and a legislative proposal to mitigate some of the effects of Alcock was drafted by the Parliamentary Law Commission in 1998, the decision in Alcock represents the state of the law in the area of liability for psychiatric harm as it currently stands. However, once it is shown that some psychiatric damage was foreseeable, it does not matter that the claimant was particularly susceptible to psychiatric illness - the defendant must "take his victim as he finds him" and pay for all the consequences of nervous shock (see, This page was last edited on 1 May 2020, at 15:00.
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Some witnessed the events on television. Such ties are, It must be reasonably foreseeable that a person of "normal fortitude" in the claimant’s position would suffer psychiatric damage. Reference this Company Registration No: 4964706. Looking for a flexible role? Those within the zone of danger created by the negligence; Those who are not within the zone of danger created by the negligence but who reasonably believe themselves to be; Those who reasonably believe they have caused the death or serious injury of another.
White v Chief Constable of the South Yorkshire Police, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Alcock_v_Chief_Constable_of_South_Yorkshire_Police&oldid=954268837, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, Negligence, nervous shock, primary and secondary victims, The claimant who is a "secondary victim" must perceive a "shocking event" with his own unaided senses, as an eye-witness to the event, or hearing the event in person, or viewing its "immediate aftermath". NEGLIGENCE – PSYCHIATRIC DAMAGE – TRAUMATIC EVENT WITNESSED INDIRECTLY – DISTINCTION BETWEEN PRIMARY AND SECONDARY VICTIMS. The overcrowding was due to police negligence.
The impact of this on the area of law once described as a '"patchwork quilt of distinctions which are quite difficult to justify"[1] is significant because the decision made by the Law Lords was heavily influenced by the greater social concern of allowing a flood of claims with which the judicial system would not be able to cope (the "floodgates argument"). Case Summary Copyright © 2003 - 2020 - LawTeacher is a trading name of All Answers Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales.
Alcock concerned psychiatric harm caused by the Hillsborough disaster of 1989.
The Judicial Committee of the House of Lords, consisting of Lord Keith of Kinkel, Lord Ackner, Lord Oliver of Aylmerton, Lord Jauncey of Tullichettle, and Lord Lowry has established a number of "control mechanisms" or conditions that had to be fulfilled in order for a duty of care to be found in such cases. For example, they did not consider a man who witnessed the disfigured body of his brother-in-law in the morgue eight hours after the disaster to have witnessed the immediate aftermath. Lord Keith of Kinkel and Lord Ackner explained that an event would not be witnessed with ‘unaided senses’ if it was seen on television or communicated by a third-party. The plaintiffs in this case were mostly secondary victims, i.e. VAT Registration No: 842417633. Each claim failed for different reasons, such as: there was no evidence of a close tie of affection; the claimants had not witnessed the events with unaided senses; and the claimants had not viewed the immediate aftermath because too much time had passed before they saw the victim’s bodies. The claimant must share a close tie of love and affection with someone injured or killed in the event; The claimant must have close geographical and temporal proximity with the event or its immediate aftermath; The claimant must have witnessed something horrifying with unaided senses; The claimant must have suffered harm by way of a ‘sudden shock’ as a result.
Lord Keith of Kinkel commented that psychiatric harm to an unconnected bystander might still be foreseeable if the event was particularly horrific.
It was argued for the plaintiffs in the present case that reasonable foreseeability of the risk of injury to them in the particular form of psychiatric illness was all that was required to bring home liability to the defendant. The decision has been criticised as being excessively harsh on the claimants, as well as not fully corresponding with medical knowledge regarding psychiatric illness brought about by nervous shock. Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of LawTeacher.net. If the nervous shock is caused by witnessing the death or injury of another person the claimant must show a "sufficiently proximate" relationship to that person, usually described as a "close tie of love and affection". A primary victim was one who was present at the event as a participant, and would thus be owed a duty-of-care by D, subject to harm caused being foreseeable, of course. Alcock & ors v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire [1992] AC 310 House of Lords. The House of Lords held in favour of the defendant. Others did not witness the event, but suffered harm when they were told their relatives had been injured or saw their bodies in the morgue or hospital. A joined action was brought by Alcock (C) and several other claimants against the head of the South Yorkshire Police. A secondary victim, by contrast, would only succeed if they fell within certain criteria.
*You can also browse our support articles here >, A close tie of love and affection to a primary victim, Appreciation of the event with their own unaided senses, Proximity to the event or its immediate aftermath. they were not "directly affected" as opposed to the primary victims who were either injured or were in danger of immediate injury.
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