2024

Cases Reported

R (Worcestershire County Council) v Secretary of State for Health and Social Care	1
Issue: If a person who had been detained under s3 Mental Health Act 1983 was placed in a different area as part of an after-care package provided for them under s117 of the 1983 Act, did that change their ordinary residence and who was responsible for after-care services if they were again detained and then discharged and left hospital?

PQR v Derbyshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust	14
Issue: Whether a First-tier Tribunal was correct to conclude that it did not have jurisdiction to consider the validity of a Community Treatment Order based on arguments that a procedural requirement for its extension was not met.

SF (as Nearest Relative of RB) v Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust and RB	20
Issue: Whether a Tribunal erred in upholding detention after finding that the treatment needed was not available on the ward where the patient was detained; whether interventions designed to protect against the risk of harm were medical treatment; whether the Tribunal erred in not adjourning; whether the appeal was academic as the patient had been discharged.

ML v (1) Priory Healthcare Ltd and (2) Secretary of State for Justice	28
Issue: Whether a Tribunal erred in law in not addressing the potential use of the Deprivation of Liberty provisions of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 when considering a patient detained under ss47/49 Mental Health Act 1983; whether its reasons were adequate.

SS v Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (Mental Health)	35
Issue: Whether a Tribunal considering an application by a patient detained under s3 Mental Health Act 1983 had erred in not adjourning for information on an aftercare package.

R v Joseph Hawkridge	41
Issue: Whether a short sentence of imprisonment which had been suspended should be replaced by a hospital order under s37 Mental Health Act 1983 in relation to a person subject to civil detention under s3 of the 1983 Act; the procedural requirements when sentencing an offender with mental disorder.

R v Francis Devlin	49
Issue: Whether a custodial sentence for serious fraud offending should have been suspended in light of the impact on the defendant’s son, who had Autistic Spectrum Disorder.

Derbyshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust v Secretary of State for Health and Social Care	57
Issue: Whether Art 6(1) ECHR applied to and was breached by proceedings in which a criminal court ordered detention in a psychiatric hospital following a finding that the applicant committed criminal acts whilst lacking mental capacity, and a civil court ruled on the modalities of detention.

Zaichenko v Ukraine (No 2)	74
Issue: Whether detention for a psychiatric examination breached Art 5(1) ECHR; whether collection of information by the police breached Art 8.

Gorbatyuk v Ukraine	87
Issue: Whether Art 6(1) ECHR was breached when a person deprived of capacity could not seek its restoration; whether Arts 8 and 14 were breached.

Kaganovskyy v Ukraine	90
Issue: Whether detention in a closed unit in a social care setting breached Art 5(1) ECHR; whether Arts 5(4) and (5) were breached; whether conditions of detention breached Art 3; the approach to proof under Art 3; whether the matter should proceed in light of the death of the applicant.

R v Nyal Jordan Huskinson	108
Issue: Whether it had been proper to allow counts to lie on the file when a defendant made subject to hospital and restriction orders after findings that he was unfit to stand trial but had committed the act of one of the charges was remitted to the trial court by the Secretary of State but not produced at court (which would have brought the hospital and restriction orders to an end); the proper steps for the Court of Appeal to take, including in relation to costs.

V v Czech Republic	113
Issue: Whether the substantive aspect of Art 2 ECHR was breached in relation to a patient in a psychiatric hospital who died when restrained, tasered and tranquilised; whether the procedural aspect of Art 2 was breached by an inadequate investigation.

Miranda Magro v Portugal	144
Issue: Whether detention in a prison hospital for several months pending placement in a psychiatric hospital of a person sentenced to preventive detention after having been found to have committed criminal offences but not to be responsible owing to mental disorder breached Arts 3 and 5(1) ECHR in light of the conditions of detention and lack of treatment beyond medication; the approach to proof under Art 3; the need for general measures in light of the cause of breaches of the ECHR.

TA v Armenia	161
Issue: Whether in-patient detention was in breach of Art 5(1)(e) ECHR.

MP v Lithuania	165
Issue: Whether detention was lawful for the purposes of Art 5(1)(e) ECHR, including for a period of 15 days after release had been ordered.

R v “ABQ”	169
Issue: Whether fresh psychiatric evidence supporting the making of orders under ss37/41 Mental Health Act 1983 in place of an extended sentence for serious sexual offending against children should be admitted; whether the appellant was dangerous; the appropriate length of a custodial sentence in light of, inter alia, mental disorder.

Arturo Medina Vela v Mexico	176
Issue: Whether the trial procedure for and security measures against those exempted from criminal liability breached various rights in the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities 2006.

Manuway (Kerry) Doolan v Australia	189
Issue: Whether the regime for detaining those unfit to stand trial, including the length and conditions of detention, breached various rights in the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities 2006; the relevance of Aboriginal ethnicity; whether domestic remedies had been exhausted.

Christopher Leo v Australia	203
Issue: Whether the regime for detention of those unfit to stand trial, including the length and conditions of detention, breached various rights in the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities 2006; the relevance of Aboriginal ethnicity; whether domestic remedies had been exhausted.

Paul Zentveld v New Zealand	218
Issue: Whether there had been an adequate investigation into allegations of torture and ill-treatment in a psychiatric unit in the 1970s; whether the Committee Against Torture had jurisdiction.

GJD v Australia	232
Issue: Whether complaints relating to detention and non-consensual treatment in a psychiatric setting were inadmissible for failure to exhaust domestic remedies.

Lucia Černáková v Slovakia	236
Issue: Whether placing a person with intellectual disabilities and autism spectrum disorder into a cage bed breached various articles of the Convention Against Torture 1984.

Malcolm John Richards v New Zealand	251
Issue: Whether there had been an adequate investigation into allegations of torture and ill-treatment in a psychiatric unit that occurred in the 1970s; whether the Committee Against Torture had jurisdiction.

Shaaban al-Sayed and Gashao Mangisto (on behalf of Hisham al-Sayed and Avera Mangisto) v Palestine	263
Issue: Whether the situation in the Gaza Strip was within Art 11 Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; whether the long-standing incommunicado detention of 2 persons with psychosocial disabilities who entered the Gaza Strip from Israel breached various rights under the CRPD; the obligations of a state in relation to territory over which it did not have control.

Christer Murne, Helene Franklert Murne and Mireille Franklert Murne (on behalf of themselves and Daniel Franklert Murne) v Sweden	278
Issue: Whether a Communication was an abuse of the right of submission in light of delays; whether it was inadmissible because the subject-matter was in an application to the European Court of Human Rights found inadmissible; whether other grounds of inadmissibility applied; whether the killing by police officers of a man with psychosocial disabilities breached Art 6 ICCPR in its substantive and investigative limbs.

Ivan Yordanov Lazarov and Yordan Ivanov Lazarov (on behalf of Valya Yordanova Lazarova) v Bulgaria	292
Issue: Whether the conditions of detention in a social care home breached Arts 7 and 10(1) ICCPR; whether the death from exposure of a patient with high needs who was not supervised adequately and left the home breached Art 6.

SM v Denmark	306
Issue: Whether an order for treatment after a finding that a person committed offences whilst of unsound mind breached Arts 14, 17 and 25 CRPD.

Victoria Clark v Chief Constable of the Merseyside Police	315
Issue: Whether, in a civil action claiming damages for assault by a claimant who was mentally unwell at the time, the trial judge had been correct to rule that force used against the claimant was reasonable; whether the detention of the claimant in the police station was lawfully extended; the correct remedy.

AS v Australia	331
Issue: Whether lengthy detention in prison after a finding of not guilty by reason of insanity, with only 1 mandatory court review and limited rehabilitation, breached Arts 9 and 10(3) ICCPR; whether the conditions and indefinite nature of detention breached Arts 7 and 10(1); whether limitations on family contact, including after transfer to a prison away from home, breached Arts 17 and 23; whether the prison transfer breached Art 27.

Robin Edward Jacobs v R	344
Issue: Whether further expert evidence should be admitted as to whether autism would affect the reasonableness of a defendant’s belief in consent to sexual contact; the relevance of autism to the reasonableness of a belief in consent.

Lancashire and South Cumbria NHS Foundation Trust v R Moon	357
Issue: Whether an Associate Hospital Manager performing functions under s23 Mental Health Act 1983 was a “worker” for the purposes of the Employment Rights Act 1996 or an “employee” by reason of a “contract personally to do work” for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010.

Alexander Lewis-Ranwell v (1) G4S Health Services (UK) Ltd, (2) Devon Partnership NHS Trust, and (3) Devon County Council	377
Issue: Whether an action alleging negligent treatment of a man who killed 3 people but was found Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity should be struck out on account of the defence of illegality.

In the Matter of an Application by RM (a Person under Disability) by SM, his Father and Next Friend for Judicial Review (Northern Ireland); In the Matter of an Application by RM (a Person under Disability) by SM, his Father and Next Friend for Judicial Review (Northern Ireland) No 2	405
Issue: Whether there was a sufficient link with medical treatment in hospital in the case of a restricted patient who was due to be transferred from hospital to a supervised community placement for a Tribunal to conclude that his severe mental impairment was of a nature or degree to warrant detention in hospital for medical treatment; the correct test in Northern Ireland and the relevance of cases relating to the statute in England and Wales; the proper use and effect of leave of absence.