English Legal Cases Maded Easy Episode 7 - Oh Dear, What Can the Matter Be - in which a public convenience becomes extremely inconvenient

Imagine how you would feel if you went into a public lavatory, shut the door behind you and when you went to leave, found the lock was broken and you couldn't get out. Oh dear! This is what happened to poor Mrs Sayers way back in the '50's when there was such a thing as a public toilet. The poor lady was well and truly stuck in the lavatory and the only thing she could think to do was to escape over the top. Unfortunately, she decided to use the toilet-roll holder as a step-ladder. Sadly for her, the toilet-roll holder did what they are put on this earth to do - that is - roll. Mrs Sayers fell and hurt her leg. I'll put you out of your misery at this point as you are probably agog with anxiety as to how badly poor Mrs Sayers was hurt and I'll tell you that apparently it "wasn't serious" but it "wasn't trivial". Mmmm...that's what I like - straight talking!

Naturally, (and let's face it, it was the call of nature that started this whole thing) Mrs Sayers took the local authority to court for their negligence in not maintaining their toilet cubicles to a proper standard and she won. She did, however, lose a portion of the damages awarded to her because the court felt that putting your whole weight on to a toilet-roll holder was probably not appropriate in all the circumstances.

This case is an example of contributory negligence - that is, that although the person suffered an injury due to somebody else's negligence, their own negligence contributed to that injury. In this case, Mrs Sayers was held to have contributed to her own injury to the level of 25%. (Case citation: Sayers v Harlow UDC (1958) 1 WLR 623).

I suppose, to be on the safe side, one should perhaps leave the door open to prevent this kind of calamity but on the other hand, there are certain things one should keep to oneself - wouldn't you agree?

Tina Morgan   www.john-kennedy.co.uk

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English Legal Cases Made Easy Episode 6 - Lord Justice Sherlock? - in which a House of Lords Judge quotes a fictional character

You have to have evidence to prove your case. If you are the Crown trying to find a 'baddie' guilty, you have to prove your case against him or her beyond a reasonable doubt. If you go to civil court, however, perhaps for a broken contract or for negligence maybe, you have to prove your case on a balance of probabilities. This means that it is more probable than not that you are right. One of the legal cases that establishes this is a shipping case. The crew of the Popi M were happily steaming across the Mediterranean when, bam, a big hole opened up in the hull of the ship which promptly sank to the bottom of the sea taking all the evidence with it. How could this have happened? The insurers declared that it was wear and tear on the ship - in other words, the old tub had just sunk and it wasn't up to them, therefore, to pay out on the insurance . The owners of the ship, however, contended that the ship had been struck by an unidentified, moving, submerged submarine that was never detected, never seen and which never surfaced. Well, let's face it, it could happen to anyone!

What was the Judge to decide? He plumped for the less implausible of the 2 accounts. Yes, he thought that plain old wear and tear was virtually impossible whereas an invisible, undetected, badly-driven submarine was much more believable.

This case was particularly unusual in that, when it got to the highest court in the land, the House of Lords, the judgment included a quotation from a fictional character. Lord Brandon said "[the Judge] fell into error in applying the approach propounded by Sherlock Holmes in that well known legal text "The Sign of Four", in which he reminded Dr Watson: "How often have I said to you that, when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?" (Case citation: Rhesa Shipping Co v Edmunds [1985] 1 WLR 948)

The outcome of the case was that the House of Lords said that if the Judge found each side's evidence equally unconvincing, then the claimant had clearly failed to prove his case on a balance of probabilities ie he had not demonstrated that it was more probable than not.

And so, the Case of the Invisible Submarine indubitably failed to convince the venerable Law Lords of England and Wales. It's all just elementary my dear Watson.

Tina Morgan  www.john-kennedy.co.uk

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English Legal Cases Made Easy Episode 5 - Oh What a Nuisance!

You know the old saying - you can't choose your family and you can't choose your neighbours - well, some of us think we are dead unlucky with our neighbours. They can be such a pain - parking their caravan on the front drive, having parties, playing the trumpet, having bonfires in the garden, you know the sort of thing. Well, the next time a little bit of smoke is floating across the garden fence or you have just heard the 150th attempt at a major C scale, spare a thought for poor old John Rylands who had been happily mining his land for coal. Like a mole he had dug some nice tunnels and was content in their construction, when, dash-it-all, the Fletchers next door built a reservoir to run their mill. Needless to say, as plastic pond-liners hadn't been invented back in 1868, the water seeped into the ground and flooded Rylands' lovingly-excavated tunnels and mine-shafts. Well, they'd put up with the trumpet-tootling and the bonfires but this was the straw that broke the camel's back.

Off they went to court but sadly, the first court said that having water on your land is not the sort of thing that you can complain about your neighbours for - even if it is a reservoir. Rylands took issue with the "nuisance" perpetrated by Fletcher but the court held that there had been no negligence by Fletcher, so tough! Rylands was clearly not the sort of person to give in; he appealed and the case finally got to the highest court in the land - the House of Lords.

So, perseverance won the day in the end and it was another great moment in the annals of English legal cases that prove a point. The point it proved is that if you take something on to your land which is likely to do mischief if it escapes and it does so, then you will be liable for the damage. Here are a few words from the Lord Chancellor for your enjoyment:

"The person whose grass or corn is eaten down by the escaping cattle of his neighbour, or whose mine is flooded by the water from his neighbour's reservoir, or whose cellar is invaded by the filth of his neighbour's privy, or whose habitation is made unhealthy by the fumes and noisome vapours of his neighbour's alkali works, is damnified without any fault of his own; and it seems but reasonable and just that the neighbour who has brought something on his own property (which was not naturally there), harmless to others so long as it is confined to his own property, but which he knows will be mischievous if it gets on his neighbour's, should be obliged to make good the damage which ensues if he does not succeed in confining it to his own property." (Lord Cairns) (Rylands v Fletcher [1868] UKHL 1)

The question was not whether Fletcher had acted with due care and caution, it was whether his actions had caused the damage. This is the doctrine of strict liability.

So next time you take rampaging cattle into your garden or produce stenches from your industrial processes or even, perish the thought, have a seriously leaky loo, be prepared to have your poor "damnified" next-door neighbour take you to court for being a right rotten nuisance.

Tina Morgan   www.john-kennedy.co.uk

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