Police negligence

Question 1

• The case, better known for involving the so-called “Yorkshire ripper”, set down the principle that police whilst carrying out their investigations owe no duty of care to individual members of the public.
• The plaintiff sued the police for inadequately investigating and failing to apprehend a suspect – Peter Suttcliffe, otherwise known as the Yorkshire Ripper. He later killed the plaintiff’s 20 year old daughter. He had committed 13 murders and 8 attempted murders over a five year period.
• The House of Lords said that the police could not owe a duty of care to the general public in relatuon to the general threat posed by criminal activities.
• However, they did recognise that the police could be held liable to people who were injured as a direct result of the police force’s acts or omissions, in circumstances where the failure to apprehend the criminal created an exceptional added risk to the plaintiff, because at least then, harm to the plaintiff would be reasonably foreseeable in a more specific sense.
• That case set down the general principle that the police do not owe a duty of care to members of the public in general

Answer 1

Hill v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire [1989] AC 53

Answer 2

Hedley Byrne v Heller [1964] AC 465 (assumption of responsibility)

Answer 3

Lockwood v Ireland [2010] IEHC 430

Answer 4

L.M. v. Commissioner of An Garda Siochana [2011] IEHC 14

Answer 5

G v MJELR [2011] IEHC 65

Answer 6

Smyth v Commissioner of An Garda Siochana [2014] IEHC 453

Answer 7

Kelly v The Commissioner of An Garda Síochána & Ors [2015] IEHC 19

Answer 8

Michael v Chief Constable of South Wales Police [2015] UKSC 2