Policing Flawed Police Investigations

This article published in 2000 analyses the very controversial decision of the European Court of Human Rights in Osman v. UK which critiqued the approach of the English courts toward blanket immunity from tort liability for some public authorities (in that case, relating to negligent police investigations). I argued that it is possible to construe Osman as standing for no broader proposition than when the domestic courts have carved out some exceptions to a general rule confirming immunity upon a class of decision-makers, litigants must be afforded the opportunity to bring their case within those exceptions or (in the case of a judge-made immunity rule) to develop further exceptions. However there is also a wider interpretation that blanket immunity for any class of potential tort feasors is likely to violate ECHR Article 6 (the right of access to the civil courts) if the common law courts do not leave themselves free to examine the merits of each case and to weigh the public policy considerations for and against the existence of the duty of care in that case. The article concludes that it would be better if negligence law could regain its original vigour and flexibility rather than forcing human rights law to do its work

Common law · Duty · Duty of care · Interpretation (philosophy) · Law and economics · Liability · Political science · Sociology · Tort · Criminal Law and Evidence · European Criminal Justice and Data Protection · Law · Ombudsman and Human Rights