The applicant challenged the refusal of the coroner to hold an inquest into the death of his daughter in Rhodesia.
Held: Coroners in England and Wales are under a duty to investigate a death which occurred overseas if both the body is returned to the coroner’s district and the circumstances are such that an investigation would have been conducted if the death had occurred in England and Wales. Donaldson LJ said that Parliament could have added a rider that if the death occurred abroad other than on the high seas, the coroner need not or even should not enquire into the cause of death. The words of this section were clearly and wholly free from ambiguity. He continued: ‘Once it is appreciated that it is the dead body lying within the jurisdiction which gives rise to the need for inquiry and which is the subject of the inquiry, the section is free from any possible objection that it creates what the Americans call a ‘long arm jurisdiction’.
and ‘The presence of a dead body in this country is a factor of significance. It creates a very real and legitimate public interest in holding an inquiry, and this interest is no way extra-territorial. In the absence of a death certificate by an appropriate authority in this country, it may well be considered essential at the very least to ascertain where the body came from, whether the deceased died in this country and, if so, how. The public interest centres upon the body which is in this country, upon the cause of death of that body and only incidentally upon where that cause or the death itself occurred.’
and ‘Inevitably a coroner conducting an inquisition into a death abroad will be faced with difficulties of evidence and so on, but that must have been so ever since the statute of George II . . Coroners are well experienced [in] dealing with such problems.’
Donaldson LJ
[1982] 3 WLR 920, [1982] 126 SJ 728, [1982] 3 All ER 1098
Coroners Act 1887 3(1) 7(1)
England and Wales
Citing:
Appeal from – Regina v West Yorkshire Coroner ex parte Smith QBD 1982
The applicant’s daughter had died in Kenya. Her body was returned to England and he sought an inquest.
Held: The court did not have jurisdiction to hold an inquest. . .
Cited by:
Cited – Shafi v HM Senior Coroner for East London Admn 20-Jul-2015
The claimant’s son had died in a prison attached to a police station in Dubai. She sought a new inquest saying that the first had been inadequate.
Held: A new inquest was ordered. There had been difficulties in that the Dubai authorities had . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Coroners
Leading Case
Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.254559
