2022

Cases Reported

Kotilainen and Others v Finland	1
Issue: Whether the right to life under Art 2 ECHR was breached by a police decision not to take away a gun from a person who then perpetrated a mass-shooting; whether the investigation breached the procedural obligations under Art 2.

Kurt v Austria	21
Issue: Whether the authorities had conducted an inadequate risk assessment, including a failure to take into account the special circumstances of risk in the context of domestic violence, and so failed to meet a positive obligation under Art 2 ECHR to protect the applicant’s children from violence by their father, Whether there was a real and immediate risk to life giving rise to an obligation under Art 2 ECHR to take preventive operational measures to protect the deceased child.

Tkhelidze v Georgia	72
Issue: Whether the police’s failure to take action in response to complaints of domestic violence was a breach of general and operational duties under Art 2 ECHR to protect life; whether the subsequent failure to investigate the police’s failure to take action that may have prevented the homicide was a breach of the procedural investigative duty under Art 2.

In the Matter of an application by Patricia Downey for Judicial Review	85
Issue: Whether the coroner had expressed a concluded view on a central issue and if so whether that amounted to actual bias or apparent bias in the form of predetermination.

In the Matter of Downey (Determination of Costs)	97
Issue: Whether the costs of successfully defending a Judicial Review application should be awarded to a coroner who had failed to comply with the pre-action protocol and with an order of the court.

R (Canham) v The Director of Public Prosecutions	100
Issue: Whether the Article 2 obligations being engaged required a ‘heightened, intensive standard of review’ for prosecutors’ decisions.

R (Ginn) v Senior Coroner for Inner London	113
Issue: Whether it was necessary to hold a fresh inquest where the coroner had omitted to direct the jury to express their findings on the central factual issues or direct the jury to decide whether any of those central issues were causative

R (Boyce) v Senior Coroner for Teesside and Hartlepool (Middlesbrough Borough Council and Tees Valley Care Ltd as Interested Parties)	135
Issue: Whether a teenager subject to a care order who was resident in a care home was in state detention such that the state’s procedural duty under Art 2 applied to her inquest.

Gribben v United Kingdom	149
Issue: Whether the United Kingdom’s investigation into a fatal shooting by soldiers in Northern Ireland met the Art 2 ECHR procedural requirement

M4 v The Coroner’s Service of Northern Ireland	172
Issue: Whether a subpoena to attend an inquest should be maintained when the compelled witness stated an intention to invoke their privilege against self-incrimination.

Senior Coroner for West Sussex v (1) Chief Constable of Sussex Police, (2) Secretary of State for Transport, (3) Mr Andrew Hill and others	182
Issue: Whether a coroner was entitled to obtain and make use at an inquest of documents and transcripts of oral evidence that had been presented in open court during a criminal trial where that material had protected status in law, being related to an Air Accidents Investigation Branch investigation.

R (Lee) v Assistant Coroner for Durham (1) Chief Constable of Durham Constabulary (interested person)	202
Issue: Whether the procedural obligations under Art 2 ECHR were triggered at an inquest; whether a separate duty arose under Art 8 ECHR that required the Coroner to investigate the wider circumstances of a death.

R (Ture) v Senior Coroner for Manchester North and others	203
Issue: Whether the Coroner had made public law errors in her inquiry, her reasoning or inquest conclusion such that her findings and conclusion should be quashed and a fresh inquest ordered.

R (Patton) v Assistant Coroner for Carmarthenshire and Pembrokeshire	215
Issue: Whether the procedural duty under Art 2 ECHR was engaged; whether a challenge to the ruling on the engagement of Art 2 was premature; whether adequate reasons had been given for the Coroner’s decision.

Re G (Child Post Mortem: delays)	230
Issue: Whether, given the delay in provision of paediatric post-mortem reports, public law child care proceedings following the death of a child’s sibling need to await a forensic post-mortem report.

Traskunova v Russia	237
Issue: Whether the death of a participant in a trial of a new medicine for schizophrenia breached Art 2 ECHR; the requirements for such trials when persons with mental illness are involved.

R (Gorani) v Assistant Coroner for Inner West London	252
Issue: Whether the Coroner had demonstrated apparent bias, conducted a sufficient inquiry, and reached lawful and reasonable findings on the evidence.

R (Davison) v Senior Coroner for Hertfordshire	263
Issue: Whether a fresh inquest should be ordered under s13 Coroners Act 1988 where new expert evidence had been obtained on behalf of the Attorney General following an application for a fiat; whether costs should be awarded against the Coroner who had not conceded the s13 application once made aware of that fresh evidence.

R v Abdul Kadir	271
Issue: Whether evidence might be taken from abroad by Whatsapp video link; the correct procedure when taking evidence from abroad and thereby seeking to exercise the powers of a UK court within the territory of another state.

R (Morahan) v Assistant Coroner for West London	279
Issue: Whether, where the deceased was a voluntary psychiatric in-patient the investigative obligations under Art 2 ECHR were engaged and whether an automatic Art 2 duty arose in cases of accidental death.

In the Matter of an application by Patricia Downey for Judicial Review (Bias)	287
Issue: Whether the Coroner had expressed a concluded view on a central issue and if so whether that amounted to actual bias and/or apparent bias in the form of predetermination.

R (Dillon) v Assistant Coroner for Rutland and North Leicestershire	299
Issue: Whether the Coroner’s decision not to issue a report aimed at the prevention of future deaths was lawful.