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Claiming Compensation when Injured in Public Place
Making a Personal Injury Claim
Limitation on Personal Injury Claims
The Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority (CICA) administers a government- backed scheme to compensate victims of violent crime, including assault, sexual attack, arson and poisoning. CICA allows you to claim compensation if you injured in any of the ways listed below, or your parent, child, spouse or partner is killed.
Personal injuries include:
Physical or psychological injury after an attack, and
Psychological injury after witnessing a violent crime, or its immediate aftermath, involving someone with whom you had a close relationship.
You can claim compensation even if the person who injured you has not been arrested or convicted of the crime. But you should offer any evidence you can that you were the victim of a crime. It will help if you can show that you reported the incident promptly to the police, assisted the police in their enquires where possible – for instance, by making a statement or attending an identity parade, and were prepared to give evidence in the court. If the person is charged, you usually have to wait for the outcome of the court case before being awarded compensation.
To claim for an injury, you must have suffered a serious physical or mental injury, or a combination of minor injuries from which you did not recover for at least six weeks and which caused you to visit a doctor at least twice. If you are awarded compensation and your condition worsens afterwards, you can ask for further compensation.
The scheme does not cover minor injuries such as cuts and bruises, road traffic accidents (unless the vehicle was deliberately targeted to injure) or sexual assault within the family if this ended before 1979 –when the rules were changed to allow compensation for injuries inflicted within the family.
CICA will not offer compensation if you were injured in a fight that you started, provoked or agreed to take part in.
Compensation (to the maximum of £500,000) may include payments for:
Physical or mental pain and suffering. These payments are based on a scale (called a tariff) in which injuries are graded according to severity. Compensation payable ranges from £1000 at the bottom of the scale to £250,000 at the top.
Loss of earnings if you were unable to work for more than 28 weeks after the attack.
Special expenses such as medical treatment, equipment and care – only payable if you can also claim for loss of earnings.
The fatal injury of a close relative – the award is a set sun (£10,000 if one person claims, £5000 each if more than one person claims), plus funeral expenses.
If you were financially dependent on the person who was killed, you can apply for a dependency award, and children can claim for loss of paternal services.
Ask for a compensation form from your local police station or Victim Support Scheme, or from CICA. You must claim within two years of the incident, except in certain circumstances, such as an application on behalf of a child.
Send your application to CICA’s Glasgow office, which will allocate you a reference number. Claims relating to incidents in London and the Home Counties are then dealt with by the London office, and those in the rest of England and Wales by the Glasgow office.
CICA takes eight months to one year to assess claims. A claims officer will write to tell you the decision, give reasons if compensation is not granted and if it is granted, say how it will be paid.
If you disagree with the decision, contact CICA for details of its appeals process.
You were caught up in a fight outside a nightclub, although you had nothing to do with it you were attacked. Someone hit you in the face with a bottle and you needed medical treatment, including stitches. You now have permanent scars on your face.
You can claim compensation. There are three main ways to do so. First, if the person who attacked you is prosecuted and found guilty, the court may order to offender to pay you compensation. You should make full information about your injury available to the lawyers prosecuting your attacker – including loss of earnings, medical and travel expenses and loss such as theft of your property or damage to clothing. This information can then be relayed to the judge.
Second, you can sue for damages, even if the offender has been acquitted of the crime in a criminal court. You can do so up to three years after your injury if it was caused by a deliberate assault.
Third, you can apply to the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority (CICA) for compensation. Before deciding which option to take, consult a solicitor.
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