The judge found that there was only one act which could have amounted to harassment, and since there had to be at least two to amount to a course of conduct he dismissed the claim under the Act.
Submissions were made about the witness immunity rule, because the one act that could have been relevant was what he held to be the malicious making of a complaint to the police, which resulted in an arrest but no prosecution. The judge said that he would not have regarded the witness immunity rule as applying to a civil action under the 1997 Act, principally because the action is not based on the particular statement but on the fact of making a complaint to the police in the course of conduct amounting to harassment. He also said that, if that were wrong, he would come to the same conclusion because the inclusion of the express provision in section 1(3)(a) made it clear that that was to be the limit of any defence of that kind to the claim.
Richard Seymour QC
[2014] EWHC 2216 (QB)
Bailii
Protection from Harassment Act 1997
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Crawford v Jenkins CA 24-Jul-2014
The parties had divorced but acrimony continued. H now complained of his arrests after allegations from his former wife that he had breached two orders. He had been released and no charges followed. The court had ruled that W’s complaints were . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Torts – Other
Updated: 16 December 2021; Ref: scu.534124