CICA Appeal increases victim’s compensation from £16,500 to £181,000
A young man was sexually abused by a family ‘friend’ when visiting the man’s house to play computer games with his cousin.
Although the abuser threatened to harm our client’s family if he informed anyone, he eventually found the courage to tell his family. As a result, the abuser was prosecuted and sentenced to 18 years in prison.
Because the abuser had no money to pay his victim compensation, we recommended that an application was made to the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority, the CICA.
We made the application on a No Win, No Fee basis. This meant that if compensation was not awarded he would not have to pay legal costs.
CICA compensation of £16,500 offered
When the application was submitted the CICA made our client an offer of £16,500.
We advised him this was not enough and asked the CICA to review of their decision. In support of the review we obtained a report from a psychiatrist. He diagnosed a severe and permanently disabling mental injury. He also said that our client would never be able to work as a result of his abuse.
As a result of the review the CICA increased their offer to £22,000. However this was still totally inadequate and we recommended that a formal appeal should be made.
Although the CICA accepted his injury was severe and permanent they said that his pre-existing learning difficulties would always have prevented him from working and accordingly they rated the claim as worth no more than £27,000.
We therefore advised him to proceed with the CICA appeal.
CICA appeal results in compensation being increased to £181,000
This was the correct decision. The Tribunal agreed with our assessment of the claim and awarded our client compensation of over £181,000.
The lawyer who dealt with the case was delighted with the outcome of the CICA appeal. She praised our client’s bravery in pursuing first the review and then the appeal.
“I couldn’t accept that my client would never have worked even if the abuse had not taken place”, she said. “I am so pleased the tribunal judges agreed and made the full award we had asked for” .
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