Malicious Prosecution needs court involvement
W had made false allegations against her husband of child sex abuse to police. He sued in malicious prosecution. She applied to strike out, and he replied saying that as a developing area of law a strike out was inappropriate.
Held: The claim was struck out. It had become clear that the tort of malicious prosecution could now apply in a civil as well as a criminal context, but the case law ‘confirms that the essence of the tort is the malicious institution of proceedings’. There was no such here and the claim was doomed to fail, and ‘The Claimant has not established any compelling reason why, in the absence of a realistic prospect of success, his claim should nevertheless be allowed to proceed to trial.’
Steyn J DBE
[2020] EWHC 1684 (QB)
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Barrett v London Borough of Enfield HL 17-Jun-1999
The claimant had spent his childhood in foster care, and now claimed damages against a local authority for decisions made and not made during that period. The judge’s decision to strike out the claim had been upheld by the Court of Appeal.
Cited – Farah and Others v British Airways and Another CA 6-Dec-1999
The Court was asked whether the Home Office can be liable for the loss caused to immigrants as a result of an immigration liaison officer negligently and wrongly advising an airline that the immigrants did not have the required documentation to . .
Cited – Bridgeman v Brown CA 19-Jan-2000
A statement of case is not suitable for striking out if it raises a serious live issue of fact which can only be properly determined by hearing oral evidence. Hale J, said: ‘the essence of a strike out is that one does not look at the evidence on . .
Cited – Hughes and others (By Their Litigation Friend) v Richards (Trading As Colin Richards and Co ) CA 9-Mar-2004
Parents and their children claimed against a tax adviser for negligence in relation to setting up an offshore trust. The defendant applied to strike out the children’s claim on the basis that the defendant owed them no duty of care and only the . .
Cited – Easyair Ltd (T/A Openair) v Opal Telecom Ltd ChD 2-Mar-2009
Principles Applicable on Summary Judgment Request
The court considered an application for summary judgment.
Held: Lewison J set out the principles: ‘the court must be careful before giving summary judgment on a claim. The correct approach on applications by defendants is, in my judgment, as . .
Cited – Swain v Hillman CA 21-Oct-1999
Strike out – Realistic Not Fanciful Chance Needed
The proper test for whether an action should be struck out under the new Rules was whether it had a realistic as opposed to a fanciful prospect of success. There was no justification for further attempts to explain the meaning of what are clear . .
Cited – E D and F Man Liquid Products Ltd v Patel and Another CA 4-Apr-2003
The rules contained two occasions on which a court would consider dismissal of a claim as having ‘no real prospect’ of success.
Held: The only significant difference between CPR 24.2 and 13.3(1), is that under the first the overall burden of . .
Cited – AC Ward and Son v Catlin (Five) Ltd and Others CA 10-Sep-2009
The defendant insurers appealed against refusal of summary judgment in its favour in defending a claim under a policy. The claimants premises had been burgled. The insurer said that the claimant had failed to respect warranties given by it as to . .
Cited – Yates v The Queen CA 1885
The Court considered whether a procedural step taken towards bringing a (criminal) libel action amounted to the commencement of a ‘criminal prosecution’ within the meaning of s.3 of the 1881 Act. . .
Cited – Martin v Watson HL 13-Jul-1995
The plaintiff had been falsely reported to the police by the defendant, a neighbour, for indecent exposure whilst standing on a ladder in his garden. He had been arrested and charged, but at a hearing before the Magistrates’ Court, the Crown . .
Cited – Willers v Joyce and Another (Re: Gubay (Deceased) No 1) SC 20-Jul-2016
Parties had been involved in an action for wrongful trading. This was not persisted with but the claimant sought damages saying that the action was only part of a campaign to do him harm. This appeal raised the question whether the tort of malicious . .
Cited – Sallows v Griffiths CA 2001
An allegation was made of malicious abuse of the legal process by procuring of the arrest of the claimant. The defendant, Mr Griffiths, made a false statement about his business associate Mr Sallows to three recipients within their company. The . .
Cited – Hunt v AB CA 22-Oct-2009
The claimant sought damages from a woman in malicious prosecution, saying that she had made a false allegation of rape against him. He had served two years in prison.
Held: The claim failed. A complainant is not a prosecutor, and is not liable . .
Cited – ERY v Associated Newspapers Ltd QBD 4-Nov-2016
The anonymised claimant sought an order restraining the defendant and its newspapers publishing material about him which he said was confidential.
Held: Nicol J said that there was a reasonable expectation of privacy in the information that a . .
Cited – Barkhuysen v Hamilton QBD 10-Nov-2016
Claims had been made between neighbours in the course of a long running neighbour dispute. In particular a claim was made of malicious prosecution as regards a complaint made to the police.
The claimant had ‘amply made out the third and fourth . .
Cited – CFC 26 Ltd v Brown Shipley and Co Ltd and Others ChD 29-Nov-2016
Complaint of the alleged sale of an underlease at a low price, working as a corrupt agreement. It was said that one of the defendants, a local council, was liable for malicious prosecution of an enforcement notice. The Council’s replied that the . .
Cited – ZXC v Bloomberg Lp CA 15-May-2020
Privacy Expecation during police investigations
Appeal from a judgment finding that the Defendant had breached the Claimant’s privacy rights. He made an award of damages for the infraction of those rights and granted an injunction restraining Bloomberg from publishing information which further . .
Cited – Richard v The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and Another ChD 18-Jul-2018
Police suspect has outweighable Art 8 rights
Police (the second defendant) had searched the claimant’s home in his absence in the course of investigating allegations of historic sexual assault. The raid was filmed and broadcast widely by the first defendant. No charges were brought against the . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Torts – Other
Updated: 09 November 2021; Ref: scu.652129