26.30JR v Secretary of State for Justice [2016] EW Misc B8 (CC)
The Probation Service was not liable for physical and emotional abuse suffered by a woman who had begun a relationship with a prisoner on licence without knowing that he had murdered his partner
Facts: JR entered into an intimate relationship with a man who had been convicted of murdering his partner and was released on licence. Information had been provided to the Probation Service that might have alerted them to this state of affairs. The man then assaulted JR and threatened to kill her. She sued the Probation Service in negligence.
Judgment: HHJ Saffman held that the Probation Service had not owed JR any duty of care because they had been discharging their statutory functions and there had not been any specific reliance on the Probation Service, in that the Probation Service had not told JR that it would investigate with a view to protecting her. In any event, on the facts, even if a duty of care had existed, the Probation Service would not have breached it because the information provided to it, about the relationship, had not been at all clear.