Nick Goodwin QC successful in the Court of Appeal in Re D [2019] EWCA Civ 2302
10th Jan 2020 | News
At a fact-finding re-hearing a child was found to have suffered a penetrative anal injury inflicted by an unidentified male, the circumstances of the injury being known only to the mother who had refused to disclose his identity or how he had hurt the child. The mother’s partner, identified in the original fact-finding hearing as the perpetrator, was exonerated, having produced fresh evidence to demonstrate his innocence. Nick Goodwin QC successfully appealed the decision on the mother’s behalf, arguing principally that the first instance judge had failed properly to re-consider whether the injury was inflicted at all in light of the only identified individual’s exoneration, in particular given the poor quality of the child’s allegation. The case has been remitted for a further fact-finding hearing.
The judgment can be found here.
