Practice—Summary judgment—Appeal

Queen’s Bench Division, Spencer J, 1 Jun 2012

It is not automatically an abuse of process in civil proceedings to seek to show that a criminal conviction was wrong; all depends on the facts. 

Richard Davison (instructed by Bolt Burdon Kemp) for the claimant. Satinder Hunjan QC (instructed by Hutton’s) for the defendant.

The claimant was a medical secretary working at the hospital at which the defendant worked as a consultant physician. In 2007, they began a sexual relationship. The claimant became pregnant. She informed the defendant and he tried to persuade her to have an abortion. She alleged that on three occasions he administered or attempted to administer drugs to her in order to procure an abortion.

She alleged that that was done by placing the drugs into her drinks. The defendant was convicted of attempting to administer poison on two of the alleged occasions. He was refused permission to appeal against conviction by the Court