Muuse v Secretary of State for the Home Department

Detention pending deportation must be authorised, justified and kept under regular review. Officials must investigate identity and nationality where relevant evidence is available, serve reasons for detention, and follow safeguards designed to prevent arbitrary detention. Persistent failures to follow those procedures may establish misfeasance in public office where officers were subjectively recklessly indifferent to the claimant’s likely injury. Immigration-function exceptions to discrimination legislation apply only to bona fide exercises of that function. Damages for false imprisonment may include basic, aggravated and exemplary awards, but double recovery must be avoided.

The claimant, a Dutch national born in Somalia, was detained after completing a sentence of imprisonment. He was detained for 128 days while the defendant pursued deportation to Somalia, despite records identifying him as Dutch and despite his repeated assertions that his identity documents were held by the prison.

The defendant admitted false imprisonment but disputed claims based on data protection, discrimination, human rights, negligence and misfeasance in public office. The court considered whether the detention and deportation process involved sufficiently serious procedural failures and subjective recklessness to justify liability beyond false imprisonment, and the appropriate compensatory, aggravated and exemplary damages.

1. False imprisonment and detention safeguards. The claimant’s detention was unlawful. No adequate lawful authority or formal reasons were provided at the outset, the detention was not properly reviewed, and the defendant failed to investigate readily available evidence of Dutch nationality. The defendant also failed to observe procedures requiring written reasons, documentary authorisation and regular review under the Immigration Act 1971, the Detention Centre Rules 2001 and the Operations Enforcement Manual.
2. Misfeasance in public office. The case fell within the second category identified in Three Rivers DC v Bank of England (No 3) [2003] 2 AC 1. Targeted malice was not established, but subjective recklessness was sufficient. The defendant’s officers showed wholesale disregard of safeguards, ignored material evidence and persisted with deportation despite information capable of confirming the claimant’s nationality. Some officers were indifferent to the consequences of their acts. Misfeasance was therefore proved against Immigration and HMPS, and consequently against the defendant.
3. Other causes of action. Any compensable data-protection loss or distress was subsumed in the false-imprisonment award. The discrimination claim failed, although the statutory immigration-function exception applied only to a bona fide exercise of that function. Article 5 had been breached, but the relevant Convention rights were adequately compensated through false-imprisonment damages. Negligence added nothing.
4. Damages. Applying the guidance in Thompson v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis [1998] QB 498 and subsequent authorities, the court awarded £25,000 basic damages, £7,500 aggravated damages and £27,500 exemplary damages. The claimant’s loss-of-income claim failed for lack of evidence. No separate award was made for misfeasance because of overlap and the risk of double counting.