Doherty v Quigley

• Jurisdiction: Ireland
• Judge: Mr. Justice Ryan
• Judgment Date: 05 July 2011
• Neutral Citation: [2011] IEHC 361
• Court: High Court
• Date: 05 July 2011

Doherty v Quigley

BETWEEN

DANA DOHERTY A PERSON OF UNSOUND MIND NOT SO FOUND

PLAINTIFF

AND

MICHAEL QUIGLEY

DEFENDANT

[2011] IEHC 361

No. 9323P/2007

THE HIGH COURT

TORT LAW

Assault

Sexual abuse - Statute of limitations - Abuse while plaintiff minor - Defendant teacher - Post traumatic stress disorder - Impairment - Disability affecting limitation period - Whether psychological injury caused by wrongdoer - Whether capacity to bring proceedings substantially impaired - Whether defendant liable - Assessment of damages - Two criminal trials - Two disagreements by jury - Nolle prosequi - Undisputed material - Evidence of behaviour close to alleged events - Relatively contemporary responses of defendant - Independent corroborative witnesses - Medical evidence - MN v SM [2005] 4 IR at 461 followed - Statute of Limitations 1957 (No 6), s 48A - Award €400,000 damages (2007/9323P - Ryan J - 5/7/2011) [2011] IEHC 361

Doherty v Quigley

Facts: The plaintiff claimed that the defendant took advantage of her as a young Irish-dancing student and that he had sexually abused her, which rendered her seriously traumatised. She instituted proceedings by way of personal injuries summons in 2007. The question arose as to the soundness of mind of the plaintiff and the impact of s. 48A Statute of Limitations of 1957, as amended. The Court had to consider whether the defendant did commit the acts of sexual abuse and whether s. 48A applied to the proceedings.

Held by Ryan J. that the plaintiff was entitled to a substantial award of damages both in respect of past pain and suffering and for future general damages but the award had to be limited in accordance with Supreme Court jurisprudence. S.48 A applied and the case of the plaintiff was not statute-barred. The proper figure for general damages in this case was Eur 400,000 and the figure for past damages would be set at Eur 250,00 and future damages at Eur 150,000.

Reporter: E.F.

STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS 1957 S48

STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS 1957 S48A

W (F) v W (J) UNREP CHARLETON 18.12.2009 2009/57/14611 2009 IEHC 542

CRIMINAL LAW (RAPE) (AMDT) ACT 1990 S7

B v DPP 1997 3 IR 140

MCGRATH EVIDENCE 2005 PARA 9.71

COMPENSATION ADVISORY COMMITTEE TOWARDS REDRESS & RECOVERY 2002

N (M) v M (S) 2005 4 IR 461

MILMO & ORS GATLEY ON LIBEL & SLANDER 10ED 2004 PARA 33.6

MALEK PHIPSON ON EVIDENCE 17ED 2009 PARAS 19.4-19.10

RESIDENTIAL INSTITUTIONS REDRESS ACT 2002 S14

1 JUDGMENT of Mr. Justice Ryan delivered the 5th July, 2011

1. Introduction

2 The plaintiff is a schoolteacher in her early 40s from Co. Donegal. The defendant is in his late 60s and he also comes from Co. Donegal. From early childhood the plaintiff was a very successful Irish dancer; she was very keen and showed great promise. The defendant was a noted teacher of Irish dancing as he still is and taught children all over Donegal. His full time job was as a compositor with the Derry Journal. He spent his spare time teaching Irish dancing at different venues around the county. The plaintiff was brought to his classes when she was very young and he quickly identified her as a rising star. From the age of twelve until the plaintiff was nineteen, she engaged intensively in practising and performing Irish dancing under the close personal tutelage of the defendant. This involved travelling around to different venues in County Donegal where the defendant held classes and also to outside venues for competitions. An indication of the plaintiff's success is that she competed in the Irish Dancing World Championships and came second during this period.

3 The plaintiff's case is that the defendant took advantage of the close access he had to her to engage in severe sexual abuse over the period from 1982 to 1989. She claims that the abuse began with relatively minor improper and offensive acts of interference with her body in the form of touching and feeling and talking and it gradually and inexorably intensified in the number of occasions when it happened, the locations and in the nature of the abusive acts that the defendant committed or required to be done to him. Ultimately, when the plaintiff was aged 16 years, the defendant was abusing her by getting her to perform fellatio and otherwise on frequent and regular occasions. The defendant was a mature authority figure who exploited his access to a young girl for grossly immoral purposes while he subverted her emotional and moral senses.

4 As a result of this abuse, the plaintiff claims that she was seriously traumatised and that she continues to suffer to this day. She has been diagnosed as suffering from post traumatic stress disorder of a very serious degree with a dissociation complex, which means that she has not processed many of the experiences that she underwent with the defendant into memories. Instead, they live with her as actual recurring events when they are recalled or when they come to her attention. This is the evidence of Prof. Ivor Browne who examined the plaintiff many years later.

5 The defendant denies all of these allegations. He says that none of them ever happened and he rejects them outright. He challenges the plaintiff in respect of the specific instances that she cites in her evidence and he also utterly rejects her claims about his general behaviour or that he behaved in any respect in the manner that she describes and complains about.

6 The plaintiff instituted her proceedings by way of personal injuries summons on the 13 ^th December, 2007, in which she was described as a person of unsound mind not so found. One of the issues focused on by the defendant is whether the plaintiff is or was at the time of the issuing of the summons a person of unsound mind. It seems likely that this approach was adopted because the plaintiff's advisers were seeking to follow an example that they understood had arisen for consideration in a high profile case from the west of Ireland in which members of the McColgan family sued the local Health Board and others for failing to come to their assistance notwithstanding evidence that they were being sexually abused. That case was settled after a number of days of hearing but it received a lot of publicity and it seems that the plaintiff's advisers were consciously seeking to take advantage of a procedure, as they understood it, that had been proposed in the McColgan case in order to overcome the effect of s. 48 of the Statute of Limitations of 1957. Obviously, there was going to be a major issue on the Statute of Limitations and that indeed has proved to be the case. One of the issues, therefore, concerns the question whether the plaintiff is a person of unsound mind not so found, as is stated in the title of the action.

7 Amending legislation enacted in 2000 inserted s. 48A into the 1957 Statute, under which a person is under a disability while suffering from a psychological injury that was caused by acts perpetrated by the wrongdoer and which is of such significance that the victim's will or capacity to decide to bring proceedings is substantially impaired. Another question in the case is whether s. 48A applies. It follows from this provision that the first thing that has to be decided is whether the defendant did actually commit the acts and behave in the manner that is alleged by the plaintiff and then the question arises whether the plaintiff was under disability within the meaning of s. 48A.

8 The issues in the case can thus be summarised as follows:-

9 1. Did the defendant commit the acts of sexual abuse or any of them that are alleged by the plaintiff?

10 2. If so, is the plaintiff or was she at a material time a person of unsound mind so that s. 48 of the Statute of Limitations operates?

11 3. If not, does s, 48A of the Act apply?

12 4. If the acts or some of them were in fact committed and if s. 48 or s. 48A applies, assess damages.

2. Facts

a. the plaintiff's evidence of abuse 1982-1989

13 The plaintiff was born on the 30 ^th April, 1970 and she grew up in Letterkenny as one of a family of eight children. She and her sisters were keen Irish dancers from a very early age. The defendant was a very well known teacher of Irish dancing in the locality and he was very highly regarded. The events with which this case is concerned began when the plaintiff was twelve, but she was a pupil of the defendant for a number of years before that. She went to classes that he held in her home town of Letterkenny and remembered going to those classes from age six and upwards. There were other pupils at the classes and the plaintiff recalled that the defendant was a very physical and tactile person who was demonstrative and outgoing and apparently affectionate. She did not make a complaint that there was anything offensive about this conduct but it obviously took on a somewhat sinister aspect when viewed in retrospect in light of her complaints, assuming that those complaints are indeed justified. During this early period before the plaintiff was aged twelve years, she was thus in the care of the defendant as a teacher on a fairly frequent and regular basis when she took her lessons with the other children of her age in the classes in Letterkenny. The plaintiff remembered in particular that the defendant would ask the children to "come and give Mickey a kiss" before they left the class. But she emphasised that that was done quite openly and in the presence of parents and nothing was thought of it at the time.

14 The plaintiff described how from the age of twelve until she was nineteen there was a gradual development of offensive sexual intimacy by the defendant in which he exploited the relationship of teacher and pupil as between her and him. It would nowadays be described as a process of grooming. She specified incidents that she recalled but she also said that...