The High Court has allowed a contempt application against a personal injury claimant to proceed while criticising the insurer’s delay in pursuing the case.

Sarah Crowther KC, sitting as a judge of the High Court in Aviva Insurance Ltd v Sakyi, said she was ‘very troubled’ by the 17-month delay in bringing the application, but concluded it was still in the public interest to give permission to proceed.

She added that the respondent, who was unrepresented and in his early 20s, should seek legal assistance to help him deal with any forthcoming contempt hearing.

The court heard that delivery driver Kelvin Sakyi, then 18, was involved in a road traffic accident in 2019 in south east London. He claimed for personal injury and for time taken off work, but also claimed for £25,000 credit hire and £1,706 for the value of his motorcycle on the basis that it was no longer roadworthy.

He had claimed to have been stationary at the time of the accident and hit from behind, but CCTV from a bus showed Sakyi clipped the offside of the car as he misjudged the space and time available to overtake as he was weaving through traffic.

Immediately after the disclosure of the CCTV, he made an application to have the footage disallowed due to delay. This application was dismissed by the district judge. The claim was discontinued on the eve of trial in 2020.

The court heard there was no communication between the parties until a Part 8 claim form and evidence were served on Sakyi personally last month. A hearing followed two weeks later.

Addressing whether a contempt application was in the public interest, Crowther said the importance and seriousness of the alleged falsehoods ‘weigh heavily in the scales’ towards permission being granted.

She said the delay for bringing proceedings was ‘significant’ and questioned why it was necessary for the insurer to wait so long. Crowther explained that the inference was that in some cases committal applications are being ‘deliberately held back because they are being used as a commercial tactic or lever to extract payment from discontinuing parties’.

‘Committal proceedings are not a means of enforcement of civil judgments and the court should be slow to allow its contempt process to be adopted as a tool for private ends,’ she added.

 

This article is now closed for comment.