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Abuse survivors & the search for justice

27 May 2022 / David Mayor
Issue: 7980 / Categories: Features , Personal injury
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David Mayor on why it’s vital to understand the needs of the client when pursuing civil claims for abuse
  • More than civil compensation is often required when helping survivors and victims of abuse.
  • Why it’s important to understand at the earliest stage what definition of justice the victim is seeking.

The civil justice system can achieve wonderful things. A judge can order you to finish what you promised to do, freeze your assets, prevent you from going to certain places, stop you issuing litigation without permission; even commit you to prison. But when it comes to tortious claims, it is nothing more than a blunt instrument.

Its aspirations are to place the injured party in the position that they would have occupied but for the commission of the tort but that is, by its very nature, a Sisyphean task. It is physically and practically impossible to put somebody in that position and, even if the court achieves that goal to the best of its abilities, the victim will still

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NEWS
Artificial intelligence may be revolutionising the law, but its misuse could wreck cases and careers, warns Clare Arthurs of Penningtons Manches Cooper in this week's NLJ
Bea Rossetto of the National Pro Bono Centre makes the case for ‘General Practice Pro Bono’—using core legal skills to deliver life-changing support, without the need for niche expertise—in this week's NLJ
Small law firms want to embrace technology but feel lost in a maze of jargon, costs and compliance fears, writes Aisling O’Connell of the Solicitors Regulation Authority in this week's NLJ
Charles Pigott of Mills & Reeve reports on Haynes v Thomson, the first judicial application of the Supreme Court’s For Women Scotland ruling in a discrimination claim, in this week's NLJ
The Supreme Court issued a landmark judgment in July that overturned the convictions of Tom Hayes and Carlo Palombo, once poster boys of the Libor and Euribor scandal. In NLJ this week, Neil Swift of Peters & Peters considers what the ruling means for financial law enforcement
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