How To Claim “Aggravated Damages” Against The Police

What are “Aggravated Damages”?

The general principle of the civil law in England and Wales is to put a successful Claimant back into the position they would have been in had the civil wrong (tort) not been committed against them by the Defendant. There is a special category of damages called “exemplary damages” which are specifically designed to punish the wrongdoer (tortfeasor) rather than make up for the losses of the Claimant – so any award of exemplary damages is a ‘windfall’ for the Claimant; as such, even in claims against the Police, exemplary damages are only rarely awarded, signalling the Court’s displeasure with the most egregious behaviour.

 So, the principle most civil claims are operating under is a strictly ‘compensatory’ one – designed to ‘make up’ for financial losses, loss of liberty or any injuries sustained, but not more than that. It is a ‘re- setting of the balance.’ Furthermore, in most cases, for example accident claims, compensation cannot be awarded for ‘injury to feelings’ – the only mental/ emotional anguish which can be compensated is that arising from a recognized psychiatric injury, diagnosed by an independent medical expert.  

However, awards for injury to feelings can be granted in exceptional cases which involve deliberate, as opposed to accidental, wrongdoing; such awards are known as “aggravated damages” and I am pleased to confirm that what is exceptional in most civil cases, is quite often achievable in cases  in which I specialise, namely claims against the Police.  

Aggravated damages give people the right to recover what the Court of Appeal in the case of Rowlands v Chief Constable of Merseyside [2006] EWCA Civ 1773 called the “intangible consequences” of “humiliation, injury to pride and dignity…the hurt caused by spiteful, malicious, insulting or arrogant conduct of the Defendant.” As was cogently observed by Moore- Bick LJ  in the Rowlands case, the type of harm which aggravated damages are designed to address can be clearly distinguished from psychiatric illness/ injury – it comprises those upsetting emotions of humiliation, anger  and resentment which “do not ordinarily result in psychiatric harm, but are no less real for that reason.”  

The applicability of aggravated damages to cases involving wrongful arrest, excessive force or other Police wrongdoing was recognized by the Court of Appeal in the seminal case of Thompson v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis [1998] QB 498 which set the parameters for many categories of damages awards in claims against the Police, and which has stood the test of more than a quarter century of legal history –    

(8) “If the case is one in which aggravated damages are claimed and could be appropriately awarded, the nature of aggravated damages should be explained to the jury. Such damages can be awarded where there are aggravating features about the case which would result in the plaintiff not receiving sufficient compensation for the injury suffered if the award were restricted to a basic award. Aggravating features can include humiliating circumstances at the time of arrest or any conduct of those responsible for the arrest or the prosecution which shows that they had behaved in a high handed, insulting, malicious or oppressive manner either in relation to the arrest or imprisonment or in conducting the prosecution. Aggravating features can also include the way the litigation and trial are conducted.”

The entitlement to aggravated damages in these cases is, quite correctly, arising because the tortfeasors are Police Officers imbued with special powers and responsibilities and hence any insulting/ malicious behaviour by them is more hurtful to the injured party than the same conduct committed by a private citizen, precisely because the wrongdoers here are agents of the law, agents of the State – and it is requisite upon them not to behave like unprofessional, undignified bullies. It is, what we might call, another method of protecting the liberty and integrity of the citizen from “high- handed oppression” – every person’s mind and body also being ‘castles’ in their own way.

How To Win Aggravated Damages

Examples of Police behaviour which can justify awards of aggravated damages include the following –  

• if the conduct took place in public or within the knowledge of your community (e.g being lead away in handcuffs in front of family members or neighbours); 
• if you were of previous good character; 
• if a wrongful arrest is exacerbated by Police Officers maintaining lies in an attempt to justify it; 
• if you were belittled, verbally abused, or otherwise humiliated; 
• if the Police were motivated by racial prejudice;   
• if the Police attempted to obstruct the investigation of any complaint you have made; 
• the way litigation and trial are conducted (e.g if the Police refuse to apologise and fight a meritorious claim ‘tooth and nail’, denying liability all the way, or almost all the way to trial).  

Normally aggravated damages will not exceed the amount awarded for ‘basic’ compensatory damages. However, in the most exceptional circumstances, a Court could award aggravated damages at a maximum of twice the amount of basic damages. 

How does this work in practice? Let me give you a recent example from a case of mine which went to trial at Oxford County Court last month.

My client Mohammad was unlawfully detained when Officers of Thames Valley Police wrongly targeted his car on suspicion of it being a ‘clone’, handcuffed him in full view of members of the public on a garage forecourt, demanded his ID and searched his car without justification. Thankfully, Mo’s detention was relatively short- lived, only around 10 minutes, but the way he had been treated by the Officers during that time caused him precisely the form of upset and humiliation which aggravated damages are designed to compensate, and I identified the following factors for the Court’s attention –

• these events took place in the full glare of the ‘public eye’;
• the Officers used abusive words to Mo, including “wanker”, “knob” and “dick” (and then tried to deny this);
• the Officers attempted to frustrate Mo’s request for a written record of what they had done to him by first denying that any search had been carried out, and then admitting that it had but trying to make Mo desist in his attempts to have them create a paper-trail by exaggerating how long the process of creating the record was going to take; in my opinion this was a deeply unprofessional, if not in fact a malicious, attempt by the Officers to avoid future scrutiny of their actions and hence proper accountability;
• subsequent false accounts made by the Officers in an attempt to avoid liability for their actions.

I am pleased to say that the arguments put forward by myself and Mo’s barrister, the excellentUna Morris of Garden Court Chambers won the day , with His Honour Judge Andrew Davies making a significant award of aggravated damages in favour of my client, stressing his disapproval in particular at the Officers’ “high- handed manner”, their “unprofessional and obstructive” attempt to deny that a search had been carried out, and their flippant comments to my client, thereby causing Mo a “justifiable sense of outrage” at his treatment.   

Indeed, the award of aggravated damages in this case increased Mo’s total compensation by almost 90%, thereby allowing him to ‘beat’ an earlier offer of settlement which had been made by the Police and recover his full legal costs – which was as it should be. This is why aggravated damages are such an important weapon in civil claims against the Police, and the fight to uphold and vindicate our fundamental constitutional rights.

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