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These cases are from the lawindexpro database. They are now being transferred to the swarb.co.uk website in a better form. As a case is published there, an entry here will link to it. The swarb.co.uk site includes many later cases.  














Coroners - From: 1985 To: 1989

This page lists 13 cases, and was prepared on 20 May 2019.

 
Regina v HM Coroner for the Eastern District of the Metropolitan County of West Yorkshire ex parte National Union of Mineworkers [1985] 150 JP 58
1985
CA
Watkins LJ
Coroners
A union picket had been knocked down by a lorry Held: The coroner had been correct not to summon a jury pursuant to the section. It was of crucial importance that the facts did not have "any particular feature which distinguishes it from any other kind of road accident to the circumstances of which courts, time and time again, have to listen in order to reach a determination be it in criminal or civil proceedings."
Coroners (Amendment) Act 1926 13(2)
1 Citers


 
Regina v West Yorkshire Coroner ex parte Smith [1985] 149 JP 97; [1985] QB 1096; [1985] 2 WLR 332; [1985] 129 SJ 131; [1985] 1 All ER 100
1985
QBD
Webster J
Coroners, Costs
The deceased's father sought an order prohibiting the coroner from conducting an inquest on his dead daughter. Among his grounds was that the coroner might appear to be biased because of an outstanding application for costs against the coroner arising out of an earlier application for judicial review reversing the Divisional Court and held that the coroner did have jurisdiction to conduct an inquest even though the deceased had died abroad. Held: There was no criticism of the coroner in those proceedings, and no suggestion of misconduct: "Mr Simon Brown submitted that it is singularly unusual for any order for costs to be made against a public judicial body in the absence of any misconduct on its part, even if that body appears at the proceedings to resist the application. Where the body does not appear at the proceedings to resist the application then in Mr Simon Brown's experience, he had never known of an order for costs being made against the judicial body in question in the absence of misconduct." The court approved this understanding.
1 Citers


 
Peach v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis [1986] QB 1064; [1986] 2 WLR 1080; [1986] 2 All ER 129
1986
CA
Fox LJ
Police, Information, Coroners
Statements made to the police about the death of Mr Blair Peach should be disclosed to his mother in her action against the police because, although they were made partly for the purpose of a complaint against the police and so would to that extent, in principle, attract public interest immunity from disclosure, they were made predominantly for the purpose of the investigation by the police of a violent death, to which no such immunity attached.
Fox LJ said: "As I understand the position it is the duty of the chief officer of police to convey to the coroner, for the purposes of a public inquest, all material in its possession touching the cause and circumstances of the death . . As a matter of sensible public administration it seems essential that the Coroner should have the material obtained by the police so that he, the Coroner, can decide what witnesses to call and to investigate the matter generally."
Purchas LJ said: "In my judgment, in the class of documents with which we are now faced there is an overwhelming bias in favour of the public interest being served by the disclosure of those documents and that, therefore, there is no justification for creating a new class of privileged documents which would be the effect of extending the class in respect of which Neilson v. Laugharne [1981] Q.B. 736 remains an authority to the class of documents with which the court is concerned in this appeal."
1 Cites

1 Citers



 
 Regina v Hammersmith Coroner ex parte Gray; CA 1986 - (1986) 151 JPR 209
 
Regina v Southwark Coroner, ex parte Hicks [1987] 1 WLR 1624; [1987] 2 All ER 140
1987
QBD
Croom Johnson LJ
Coroners
The verdict of 'lack of care' at an inquest is to be used to indicate only the condition of the deceased at the time of death as a cause of death, and is not to be used as a way of attributing fault. The admission of documentary evidence by a coroner is controlled by Rule 37 and that the use of and reference to documents is narrowly circumscribed. In this case the issue of 'lack of care' should have been investigated and left to the jury.
1 Citers


 
Regina v HM Coroner, Lincoln, ex parte Hay Unreported, 19 February 1987
19 Feb 1987


Coroners

1 Citers


 
Regina v Shrewsbury Coroner's Court ex parte British Parachute Association (1987) 152 JPR 123; Times, 21 September 1987
21 Sep 1987
QBD
Lloyd LJ and Mann J
Coroners, Costs
Coroners are forbidden by the rules to make recommendations to a jury as to their verdict. Despite the fact that the coroner was represented at the appeal, the court refused to make any order for costs against the coroner. This was not a case where they could express strong disapproval of the coroner, there being no special circumstances .
Coroners Rules 1984 (1984 No 552) 36(2)
1 Citers


 
Regina v Greater Manchester Council ex parte Worch [1988] 1 QB 513
1988

Slade LJ
Coroners, Litigation Practice
The court considered to what extent it could look to the form of an Act before it was amended in order to assist it in construing the Act as amended: "The original section 21(a) of the [Coroners (Amendment) Act] 1926 is no longer law, since it has been replaced by Section 23(3) of the Births and Deaths Registration Act 1953. Nevertheless, the original subsection is admissible in construing the section as a whole and, in our judgment, throws light on its construction. It demonstrates that the section as a whole contemplates a two-stage process".
Births and Deaths Registration Act 1953
1 Citers



 
 Regina v Portsmouth Coroner, ex parte Anderson; 1988 - [1988] 2 ALL ER 604
 
Regina v East Sussex Coroner Ex parte Healy [1988] 1 WLR 1194; [1989] 1 All ER 30; (1989) 153 JP 1; (1988) 152 JPN 771; (1988) 132 SJ 1216
1988
QBD

Coroners
The death occurred whilst diving some eight or nine miles offshore. The applicant, the deceased's father challenged the coroner's decision to refuse jurisdiction for an inquest. Held: The body was not, in the terms of the 1926 Act, 'in or near the area within which he had jurisdiction'. Held: The wording used ordinary words of the English language, and its interpretation was within the coroner's discretion. The distance was such as to make the coroner's decision proper.
Coroners (Amendment) Act 1926
1 Cites

1 Citers



 
 Regina v West London Coroner ex parte Gray; CA 1988 - [1988] QB 467
 
In re Rapier (Deceased) [1988] 1 QB 26
1988
QBD
Woolf LJ, Simon Brown J
Coroners
A young prisoner had been found dead in his cell hanging. A report suggested that he may have been sniffing solvents. The coroner himself initiated proceedings both under the Coroners’ Act and for judicial review to quash the inquisition over which he had presided in the light of new evidence which had later come to light. There was no respondent to the application, merely counsel appointed as amicus curiae. Held: The application was granted. Amongst the "compelling grounds for ordering a fresh inquest", were that "the coroner himself believes it to be necessary and has indeed initiated the application". It is the coroner himself who must seek a new inquest, bearing in mind the reasonable concerns of the family of the deceased. When the court considers ordering a new inquest, it must look at the likelihood of a different verdict.
Woolf LJ said that it was not necessary to show that it was likely that a different verdict would be reached to order a new inquest, only that a different verdict might be reached: "This appears to be a much more satisfactory approach because, in many cases, and I would include this case as an example, it will be quite impossible to say what will be the effect of the new evidence. The effect which it will have will only be known after the witnesses have given their evidence and have been questioned. They may then be believed or they may not be believed. However, whatever the outcome, it still may be in the interests of justice that their evidence should be explored in public before a jury."
Simon Brown J said: "In many cases it will be quite impossible for the reviewing court . . to form any sensible view upon whether the new evidence creates a probability or only a possibility that a different verdict would be arrived at upon a fresh inquisition. That would generally depend upon the precise evidence eventually given and the credibility of the witnesses that give it . . this is not to say, however, that it will not generally be of the first importance to consider so far as possible the likelihood or otherwise of a fresh inquest arriving at a different verdict. That will always be relevant, often critical and sometimes wholly decisive, not least in 'new facts or evidence' cases."
Coroners act 1988 13
1 Citers



 
 Regina v HM Coroner for Portsmouth Ex parte Keene (John); QBD 1989 - (1989) 153 JP 658; [1990] COD 7; (1989) 153 JPN 706 (DC); Guardian, 24 June 1989
 
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