Judicial review of unlawful killing inquest conclusion

The Divisional Court (Stuart Smith LJ and Fordham J) has today (23 January 2023) handed down its judgment in the judicial review brought by the Humberside Police firearms officer, known as B50. The judicial review arose from the inquest into death of Lewis Skelton who died as a result of being twice shot by B50, an Authorised Firearms Officer. B50 had responded to multiple emergency calls from members of the public who reported Mr Skelton walking towards Hull city centre whilst carrying an axe.

At the inquest, which lasted six weeks, the jury concluded that Mr Skelton had been unlawfully killed. The judicial review is the first challenge arising from the lethal use of force by an Authorised Firearms Officer since the Judgment of the Supreme Court in R (Maughan) v HM Senior Coroner for Oxfordshire [2021] AC 454.

B50 – supported by the Chief Constable of Humberside Police – brought the claim for judicial review on three grounds:

• The Assistant Coroner did not apply the Galbraith plus test correctly in his written decision to leave an unlawful killing conclusion to the jury and thereby erred in law.
• The Assistant Coroner’s decision to leave unlawful killing was an error of law even if he had applied the Galbraith plus test correctly because there was insufficient evidence to support it.
• The Assistant Coroner’s summing-up of the case to the jury was deficient and inadequate.

In a detailed judgment, the Court rejected the challenge but has provided important guidance on ambit of the Galbraith plus test which coroners must consider when deciding which possible conclusions to leave to an inquest jury. The judgement can be found here.

The Court also considered and commented on when a summing-up to a jury may render an inquest conclusion unsafe. Whilst the Court agreed that aspects of the Assistant Coroner’s summing-up and directions – which lasted around two and a half days – were “maladroit” and “sub-optimal”, the Court declined to interfere with the jury’s conclusions.

Jason Beer KC and Jonathan Dixey acted for the Chief Constable of Humberside Police both in the inquest and judicial review. The Judgment can be read here.

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Authors

Jason Beer KC

Call 1992 | Silk 2011

Jonathan Dixey

Call 2007

Related areas

Inquests

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Police Law

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