Joseph McCaughley, Litigation Solicitor at Medical Protection, looks at his recent successful defence of a member against a secondary victim claim for psychiatric injury. Witness the event with their own unaided senses The defendant argued that the mother was a secondary victim since RE survived and the cause of RE’s permanent injuries was the negligent treatment following her birth. Rule 5: ‘Shocking’ requires something truly extraordinary. Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police concerned sixteen unsuccessful claims for psychiatric injury (PI) resulting from the Hillsborough disaster. [2] Hillsborough ... For a duty to be owed to protect a secondary victim from psychiatric harm, the following criteria must be met: The claimant must share a close tie of love and affection with someone injured or killed in the event; Found in: PI & Clinical Negligence. A primary victim is a victim who is directly involved in an accident and suffers injuries as a result of the fault of a tortfeasor. The principles of secondary victim claims are well established. Witness the event with their own unaided senses. A primary victim didn’t owe a duty of care to a third party which in this instance was the emergency services. Alcock needs unstitching It seems obvious that the effect of what they saw would have been profound and damaging. But this wasn’t taken forward and the courts still refer back to the Alcock test as main … Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire – Case Summary. Following the Hillsborough cases (Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police [1992] 1 AC 310.) Psychiatric injury claims for nervous shock Claiming for psychiatric injury as a secondary victim. The individual must: have a relationship of love and affection with the victim; come across the ‘immediate aftermath’ of the event; have direct perception of the harm to the primary victim; … In the case of Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire [1992] 1 AC 310, brought by relatives … But the Alcock case, which went all the way to the House of Lords’ Judicial Committee, imposed a series of “control mechanisms” to fetter a victim’s ability to bring a claim. Psychiatric injury—secondary victims Practice notes. If the defendant’s self-inflicted injuries caused that third party psychiatric injury, the … With the passage of 27 years, other cases have expanded upon what is meant by each of the criteria, but the category of secondary victims who can claim damages remains broadly the same. It submitted that as a secondary victim the Claimant could only recover if her injury had been caused by shock, citing the criteria set out in the case of Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire. A secondary victim is one who suffers psychiatric injury not by being directly involved in the incident but by witnessing it and either: • seeing injury being sustained by a primary victim, or • fearing injury to a primary victim. This Practice Note reviews the lead case of Alcock v Chief Constable of Yorkshire Police and considers the criteria which secondary victims must satisfy to successfully obtain damages following an accident involving the primary victim. In Alcock, Lord Oliver identified several elements which had been found in the reported cases to be the essential criteria for a successful secondary victim claim, including most fundamentally (as recently emphasised in Liverpool Women’s Hospital NHS Foundation Trust v Ronayne[2015], hereafter referred to as Ronayne) that the … Secondary victims must demonstrate the four Alcock criteria are present in order to establish liability: 1. 2. This … If you can't read this PDF, you can view its text here. A secondary victim is one who suffers nervous shock without himself/herself being directly exposes to any physical danger in the accident to the primary victim. They would need to satisfy strict eligibility criteria to claim. Secondary Victim Cases – in the Context of Tort Cases Generally The Need for Control Mechanisms in Secondary Victim Cases (a) The relationship between 2V and PV (close ties of love and affection) (b) 2V’s experience of the threat or injury to PV –Physical proximity to incident in time and in space (i.e. The claimants were all classed as secondary victims since they were not in the physical zone of danger. Ultimately, the court pinpointed the relevant point in time as when the negligence occurred, which, in this case, began when RE’s body remained in … Background law (Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police [1992] 1 AC 310 HL) – Criteria for cases involving secondary victims is set down in the case of Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police (“the Hillsborough case”) and requires:- that the psychiatric injury is caused by ‘shock’ from ‘the sudden appreciation by sight or by sound of a horrifying event, which violently agitates the mind’; Secondary victim claims. Rule 4: Your best hope is to make your client a primary victim. Published 21 noviembre 2018. In Alcock, Lord Oliver identified several elements which had been found in the reported cases to be the essential criteria for a successful secondary victim claim, including most fundamentally (as recently emphasised in Liverpool Women’s Hospital NHS Foundation Trust v Ronayne , hereafter referred to as Ronayne) that … Secondary Victim Claims Briefing - June 2020 1 Chancery Lane To view this article you need a PDF viewer such as Adobe Reader. It is arbitrary and unfair. 3. This was a very sad case in which the deceased, Parminder Singh Paul, was admitted to New Cross Hospital in Wolverhampton in … The Master of the Rolls, Lord Dyson, looked again at secondary victim claims and reiterated that the strict control mechanisms set out by the (then) House of Lords in the post-Hillsborough disaster decision of Alcock, in 1992, should be applied by Judges to limit the ambit of permissible secondary victim claims unless … In order to recover damages as a secondary victim a claimant must fulfil the well know criteria set out in Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police [1992] 1 AC 310, namely that: Recent cases have addressed the categories of secondary victim and the criteria relating to proximity; arguably reducing the scope for secondary victim claims on clinical negligence matters. For secondary victims to succeed in a claim for psychiatric harm they must meet the following criteria: 1. To decide whether Alcock … SMQ Legal solicitors lead by the Partner, Suezanne King, are actively involved in the interpretation of the secondary victim criteria, set by the case of Alcock, and analyse here by Suezanne’s team when and where this criteria requires extension to include a wider category of claimant given how ‘proximity’ no longer … Since the case of Alcock v Chief Constable of Yorkshire Police was decided following the Hillsborough disaster in 1989, it has been well established that certain criteria must be met by the Claimant, to successfully bring a compensation claim for psychiatric injury as a secondary victim. The Defendant Trust argued that the Claimant was a secondary victim. Alcock criteria liability Liability for Psychiatric Harm Secondary victim Tort law; Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire [1992] 1 AC 310 is Tort Law case concerning a secondary victim of psychiatric harm. It was agreed between the parties that the only issue was whether they could … The criteria for a claim for psychiatric injury by a secondary victim is cited in Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police [1992]. Of course, if this is the case, Rack & Horse Lighting will be liable in full (assuming Hannah fulfils the criteria of a primary and/or secondary victim), even though a particular vulnerability or susceptibility means that the claimant suffers much greater psychiatric harm than might have been anticipated (Brice v Brown [1984]). Summary: Alcock (the Claimant) and other claimants brought a joint claim against the South Yorkshire Police. Lord Oliver distinguished between primary and secondary victims to clarify the law and establish mechanisms to scrutinise secondary victims claims. The so-called ‘control mechanisms’ from McLoughlin v O’Brian [1983] 1 A.C. 410 and Alcock v Chief Constable South Yorkshire Police [1992] A.C. 310 are additional criteria keeping the gates to successful claims for secondary victims. A close tie of love and affection . Rule 3: It is almost impossible to win a secondary victim claim. 1. directly The article examines the evidence for the threshold requirement that distress must qualify for a psychiatric diagnosis to be actionable, and for the Alcock secondary victim criteria. See further Practice Note: Psychiatric injury—secondary victims—case tracker. In the recent case of Paul v Wolverhampton Health Authority [2019] EWHC 2893, the defendant was successful in its application for strike out of two secondary victims claims.. Who can claim for a secondary victim psychiatric injury? Rule 6: Walters was correctly decided but will rarely be followed. Where confusion has crept in is where the Courts have tried to extend the link between a secondary victim and the event by allowing for recovery if the … Know your victim: Primary or Secondary! Subject to satisfying the other criteria in Alcock, this is why a duty is readily imposed where a secondary victim witnesses an accident caused by a defendant. An entirely different set of rules and criteria are applied for primary or secondary … Rule 2: Alcock remains the law. The claimants were all classed as secondary victims since they were not in the physical zone of danger. Secondary victims are those who sustain psychiatric injuries by witnessing an event involving a primary victim. The outcome provides further clarity on the proximity test arising from the Alcock control mechanisms particularly in clinical negligence omission cases. The recent High Court decision in YAH -v- Medway NHS Foundation Trust is a helpful reminder of the principles to be considered when deciding the 'status' of an injured party and the importance of getting it right. The claim however failed on policy grounds due the claimant was a secondary victim under Alcock test criteria. The leading House of Lords decision on nervous shock is Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police [1992] 1 A.C. 310, which followed the disaster at Hillsborough football ground in 1999. The claimants, as secondary victims, had to satisfy the criteria for the imposition of liability formulated by the House of Lords in McLoughlin v O’Brian [1983] 1 AC 410 and Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police [1992] AC 310. in order for a ‘secondary victim’ to qualify for a damages award he/she must: have suffered a ‘reasonably foreseeable’ psychiatric injury; have had a close personal relationship with the primary victim (either a … It contends that these legal rules are based in misconceptions about mental illness and trauma, and suggests an alternative … Control mechanisms A close tie of love and affection to a primary victim. Maintained • . o McLoughlin v O'Brian laid down criteria by which claim by secondary victim could be assessed, while opposing expansion HoL adopted and approved McLoughlin criteria in decision of Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire [1991] 4 All ER 907 which is leading case in regard to secondary victims The Alcock decision was issued by the House of Lords in 1992 and its principles remain central to the law. There should be a list of relationships that would be sufficient to satisfy the criteria for claims as a secondary victim, and I would expect that close friends’/family members would also satisfy by introducing this legislation.. It was decided in Alcock that in order to succeed in bringing a claim as a secondary victim, claimants must prove eligibility criteria as follows: This has led some commentators and firms representing claimants to suggest that Parliament should intervene to make it easier for these claims to … 2. 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