Corr (Administratix of The Estate of Thomas Corr (Appellate) v Ibc Vehicles Limited

Where a breach of duty foreseeably causes personal injury and severe depression, a suicide resulting from that depression need not be separately foreseeable before dependency damages may be recovered under the Fatal Accidents Act 1976. A deliberate act does not break the chain of causation where a disabling illness caused by the defendant impaired the victim’s capacity to make a reasoned and informed decision. Criminal insanity is not required. Objective unreasonableness and volenti non fit injuria provide no independent defence in those circumstances. Suicide may in principle constitute fault under the Law Reform (Contributory Negligence) Act 1945, depending on the degree to which personal autonomy remained. An appellate court should not impose a reduction without adequate evidence, argument and findings.

Mr Corr suffered severe physical and psychological injuries in a workplace accident caused by his employer’s admitted negligence. He later developed severe depression which impaired his ability to make reasoned and informed judgments. Almost six years after the accident, he took his own life.

His widow continued his existing claim as personal representative and also sought dependency damages under section 1(1) of the Fatal Accidents Act 1976. The estate claim was not disputed. At first instance, the deputy judge rejected the dependency claim because suicide was outside the employer’s duty and was not reasonably foreseeable. The Court of Appeal, by a majority, allowed the widow’s appeal: [2006] EWCA Civ 331, [2007] QB 46.

The employer appealed. The central questions were whether the suicide was too remote, fell outside the scope of duty, constituted a new intervening act, was excluded by unreasonableness or consent, or justified a reduction for contributory negligence.

1. Disposition. The House dismissed the employer’s appeal by a majority of four to one. Liability for the suicide was upheld unanimously. Lord Scott dissented only on the consequential question of contributory negligence, on which he would have reduced the damages by 20%.

2. Scope of duty and remoteness. Per Lord Bingham, with Lord Walker in full agreement and Lord Mance and Lord Neuberger agreeing on liability, the employer’s duty to avoid personal injury embraced psychological as well as physical injury. The accident caused severe depression, and the depression caused the suicide. The suicide therefore fell within the scope of the duty. It was unnecessary to establish that suicide itself had been foreseeable. Severe depression was foreseeable, and a tortfeasor need not foresee the precise form taken by foreseeable injury. Suicide was not so unusual a manifestation of severe depression that it lay outside reasonable foreseeability.

   Lord Scott reached the same result through the principle that a defendant must take the victim as found. Lord Bingham, Lord Scott and Lord Walker treated Page v Smith [1996] 1 AC 155 as supporting the treatment of physical and psychiatric injury. Lord Neuberger, with Lord Mance, considered that decision unnecessary to the result and left its correctness open.

3. Causation. Per Lord Bingham, an independent, voluntary and informed decision by an adult of sound mind may constitute a novus actus interveniens. Mr Corr’s suicide was different. It was the response of a person suffering from a severe depressive illness caused by the employer’s tort, which impaired his capacity for reasoned and informed judgment. The suicide did not break the chain of causation. Recovery did not depend upon satisfying the criminal insanity test in M’Naghten’s case.

4. Unreasonableness and consent. Per Lord Bingham, the objective unreasonableness of suicide had no independent effect because the conduct was induced by the employer’s breach. The defence of volenti non fit injuria also failed. The suicide was not an act voluntarily accepted with full and unimpaired judgment.

5. Contributory negligence. Lord Bingham, Lord Mance and Lord Neuberger considered that the issue had received inadequate evidence and argument below and that imposing a reduction would be unfair. Lord Walker agreed that there should be no reduction and considered Mr Corr free of blame and causal responsibility. The award therefore remained unreduced.

   Lord Scott, Lord Mance and Lord Neuberger nevertheless considered that suicide during tortiously induced depression could, in principle, involve contributory fault. The degree to which the depression had overborne personal autonomy would be relevant. Lord Scott would have attributed 20% responsibility to Mr Corr, but that view did not affect the order.

1. House of Lords: In [2008] UKHL 13, the employer’s appeal was dismissed by a majority of four to one. Liability was upheld unanimously, and the Court of Appeal’s unreduced award remained in place.
2. Court of Appeal: By a majority, Sedley and Wilson LJJ allowed the widow’s appeal and awarded the additional dependency damages; Ward LJ dissented: [2006] EWCA Civ 331, [2007] QB 46.
3. First instance: Mr Nigel Baker QC, sitting as a deputy judge, rejected the dependency claim. He held that suicide fell outside the employer’s duty and was not reasonably foreseeable. No citation is stated in the judgment.