02 Feb 2007

Families whose loved ones have died while in state custody could be denied justice under current plans in the Government’s Corporate Manslaughter Bill, said Liberty today.

The human rights group is calling for exemptions that would effectively relieve prisons, secure mental health units, secure children’s homes, immigration removal centres, court cells and police cells from prosecution if their gross negligence kills to be thrown out. 

Jago Russell, Policy Officer for Liberty, said: 
 
“Victims’ rights should be at the heart of the Government’s fervent home affairs agenda but this bill as it stands today would deny justice to bereaved families.” 
 
The House of Lords will vote on Monday 5 February on a proposal to ensure that deaths in custody are not excluded from the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Bill. 
 
The amendment is to be tabled by Labour Peer Lord Judd, Conservative Peer Lord Hunt, Lib-Dem Peer Lord Lee, and Crossbench Peer Lord Ramsbotham and supported by Liberty, the Prison Reform Trust, Justice, and INQUEST. 

If the amendment is passed in the Lords the Government is expected to put up a fight when it returns to the House of Commons. However, Chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee John Denham and Chair of the Joint Committee on Human Rights Andrew Dismore plan to join the opposition partners in support of the amendment. 
 
Examples of exemption from the offence include:
 
• Under Clause 3 and 5 of the bill, the prison services could not be prosecuted for and convicted of the offence of corporate manslaughter even it were established that its gross negligence caused the death of a prisoner such as Zahid Mubarek. Mubarek was beaten to death with a table leg in his cell at Feltham Young Offenders' Institution in March 2000 by his cellmate Robert Stewart who was known by the Prison Service to be a violent and racist psychopath.
 
Contact: Jen Corlew on 0207 378 3656 or 0797 3 831 128 
 
NOTES TO EDITORS
 
1. Liberty welcomes the proposal for a statutory offence of corporate manslaughter which will fill a significant gap in existing criminal law. A new offence might provide justice to families who lose loved ones in terrible incidents like the Hatfield derailment, the capsizing of the Herald of Free Enterprise or the many work-place deaths that occur each year. However, Liberty believes the Bill’s numerous exemptions for Government and its agencies are neither acceptable nor necessary. 
 
2. Liberty’s Suggested Amendment for House of Lords Report Stage on deaths in custody January 2007 and its briefing for the Second Reading in the House of Commons on the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Bill October 2006 can be found on the policy pages of the Liberty website. 
 
3. In its current form the Bill would deny justice to families that lose loved ones in circumstances like the tragic cases of Victoria Climbie, Zahid Mubarek, Baha Mousa, Jean Charles de Menezes, Naomi Bryant or the young recruits who died in Deepcut barracks. Justice for bereaved families should not depend on who was grossly negligent or what activities they were carrying on at the time. A mother whose son is killed as a result of a grossly negligent decision to allow a dangerous criminal out of prison early has just as much right to justice as a mother whose son is killed by the grossly negligent handling of dangerous machinery in a factory. 
 
4. Liberty is concerned about other exemptions in the Bill, including: 
  
• Deaths caused by gross negligence in the course of military operations, when preparing for or supporting such operations and during hazardous training activities are expressly exempted from the offence in Clause 5. For example, the families of Sean Benton, 20, Cheryl James, 18, Geoff Gray, 17, and James Collinson, 17, the four young soldiers who died of gunshot wounds at Deepcut Barracks in Surrey between 1995 and 2002, might be denied a remedy under the new laws. 
  
• A new immunity covers deaths arising from gross negligence in the performance of functions to protect children from harm or in relation to the activities of probation services (child protection and probation). The exemption could apply in a case like Victoria Climbie, who was tortured to death by her great-aunt and the woman's boyfriend in 2000. Victoria was seen by dozens of social workers, nurses, doctors and police officers before she died but all failed to spot and stop the abuse as she was slowly tortured to death.