Case for Compensation

by Douglas Stewart

  “No! I don’t agree. I did what I could.”

  “Now, about that dog?”

  “Yes?” The resignation was etched boldly on the witness’s face.

  “Bed by midnight always? Ever since that incident? Is that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And this occasion when your lorry left the road was six weeks before the collision with the Ford?” The Q.C. was referring to Wally Wood’s statement. Deliberately he had not led evidence on this part, preferring to leave it for cross-examination.

  “Yes—six weeks.”

  “But Monsieur Bouchin, I have a statement here.” He jabbed at Alistair Duncan’s proof with his left hand. “This states that you were up all night on a date long after your lorry left the road—supposedly because of a dog.” The voice was contemptuous.

  “Then Mr Wood is lying.”

  “The statement is not from Mr Wood.”

  “Then whoever gave the statement is lying.” And then it dawned on him. He remembered the incident on the boat.

  “That’s a serious allegation against my instructing solicitor, Mr Alistair Duncan. You’re lying, Monsieur Bouchin.”

  “No.”

  “You had lived it up on the boat and set out for Basingstoke without sleeping for 24 hours.”

  “Not so.”

  “M’Lud I ask for leave under Order Thirty-eight to call evidence in rebuttal.” Holden expected trouble. It was borderline.

  “I shall consider your request at the end of this witness’s evidence. I find him most unsatisfactory.”

  The Q.C. resumed his examination. “You are a man without scruples. You’ve come to this Court intent on lying and have perjured yourself, disregarding the consequences. I suggest this Court can place no reliance on a single word you’ve said.” Bouchin said nothing, so Holden addressed the shorthand writer. “I trust that you will record that the witness made no denial.” Holden sat down exhausted.

  It was rare to see Sir Godfrey look angry, for he was a man of even emotions. “Now, Monsieur Bouchin,” he commented. “I’ve heard your evidence. You must tell me whether you stand by it. But I must warn you. In view of your other answers and admitted untruths, I shall be forced to take the strongest possible action against you if I have evidence from Alistair Duncan which satisfies me that you have in fact been up all night and playing cards on a date subsequent to what I will call the ‘dog incident’. Think carefully, Monsieur Bouchin.”

  It took an age for the interpreter to get the message across.

  “I admit,” Bouchin eventually mumbled, “that I was up all the night before the accident.”

  “Playing cards?” questioned the Judge.

  “Yes.”

  “Drinking as well?”

  “Yes. My share of a bottle of pernod.”

  “Thank you.” The Judge turned to Mr Hambleton Jack.

  “Any re-examination, Mr Jack?” There was, but it was a cursory affair. The extent of the Frenchman’s deception was too serious to paper over with a few retrieving questions. He hurried through a few points anxious to get the man out of the box as quickly as possible. Bouchin returned to the back of the Court.

  “I wonder if someone can help me about the tachograph. Should I regard it as a type of Black Box?”

  “A good approximation, M’Lud but, unfortunately, not as indestructible.” Giles Holden handed up an explanatory leaflet.

  “Thank you, Mr Holden. Just one other point which occurs to me. Has evidence of speed recorded in a tachograph ever been admitted before in an English Court?”

  “M’Lud, yes. In a speeding case, I believe.”

  “Do you suggest, therefore, that there has been a deliberate destruction of evidence upon which I could have relied conclusively as to speed?”

  “M’Lud, in my submission, yes.”

  “Thank you. I am sure you’ll have something to say about that later Mr Jack but I daresay you have some further evidence?”

  “I propose calling my expert engineer, Mr Alexander Hartley.”

  Duncan slipped out of the Court, anxious to interview Miss Carter. She was in the foyer, reading a magazine. He was quickly on terms with her, but even before he had finished checking her evidence there was a rustle from inside the Courtroom and everyone was coming out. It was four-fifteen. Only when he had checked everything, did he seek out Giles Holden and Roger Tulip.

  “Do you think we’ve turned the Judge?”

  “Yes; I think we have,” came Holden’s reply, “but don’t tell your client will you? Their expert engineer was impressive.”

  Duncan shook his head. “By the way, Bouchin fell for that trick, didn’t he?”

  The Q.C. smiled wolfishly. “It was a calculated risk. I’m glad I wasn’t challenged as to the date of your observation. You would have been in the box if Bouchin hadn’t capitulated. But I hear you’re well experienced at appearing in witness boxes.” That wolfish smile appeared again and Duncan laughed.

  “Oh yes! something else—Miss Carter tells me that Alice Goodhart’s having an affair with some salesman. She doesn’t know how serious.”

  “Broken backs and broken marriages often go together. Anyway, no point in dwelling on that. See you tomorrow.” The Q.C. disappeared, closely followed by his faithful Junior.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven – EXETER—DAY THREE

  Cross-examination by Giles Holden of the defendant’s engineer took half an hour. He was not to be shifted from his view that Bouchin had no chance to avoid the accident. Logic, banter and hectoring were tried by the Q.C. in vain. In those circumstances, the only thing to do is to sit down. This is what Giles Holden did. There was no re-examination.

  “Miss Sandra Carter, please.” Heads turned to watch the trim, well-organised person. Her hair, black turning to grey, made her seem older than thirty-nine and yet her rounded features and warm smile made it surprising that she had never married.

  She took the oath briskly. Her evidence was brisk too. She proved in a moment that the telephone records were kept by her and had been for seventeen years. She completed the records every day. The floor belonged to Giles Holden.

  “Miss Carter, your job, as I understand it, is to maintain these admirable records?”

  “Correct.”

  “Is that your sole responsibility?”

  “A major responsibility.”

  “You’re on call from nine a.m. until five p.m.?”

  “More or less. The liaison officers should call between nine o’clock and nine forty-five. There are seven of them. Each call takes probably only about three minutes, on average, and I can easily deal with them during the three-quarters of an hour. Later in the day I deal with the Kalamazoo records and liaise with any customers; so that I can direct salesmen to their further calls in the most efficient way.”

  “Between nine and nine forty-five, I suppose you have . . . any number of different pieces of paper in front of you?”

  “Yes. Notes of telephone calls from customers, messages from the Managing Director, the Sales Director and so on.”

  “What you don’t have in front of you, I suggest, Miss Carter, is the chart, now produced to the Court, with the full details of each call, carefully noted. Is that right?”

  It was not a shot in the dark. Alistair Duncan had established this the previous afternoon.

  “Right. One can’t fill in the chart on the phone. There isn’t time. As soon after nine forty-five as I can I fill in the details of messages received and passed on.”

  “At what time would that be?”

  “Oh, it varies. Any time between nine forty-five and lunch time. It depends on general pressure of work, I suppose.”

  “So that, in theory, at any rate, Mr Goodhart, for example, could phone in between nine and nine forty-five, and if you were taken ill at nine forty-five his record wouldn’t show that he had phoned in at all?”

  “It’s possible.” She was on nobody’s side. “But I wasn’t ill on the day of the accident.”

>   “Are you positive that Mr Goodhart did not phone in?”

  “I can’t say from memory. I can only say that my records show that he did not.”

  “When were you first asked to think about this point?”

  “Last week,” the witness smiled in amusement.

  “In other words, you have been asked to recall whether or not someone telephoned you on a certain day some sixteen months after the event?”

  “Yes.”

  “You wouldn’t swear then, from memory alone, that you had received no call from Roger Goodhart that day?”

  “No, I would not.”

  This time she smiled confidently towards the Judge who smiled back, as he assessed the implications of that evidence. It was something of a joke among lawyers that Sir Godfrey Salford had an eye for the ladies. ‘Gorgeous Godfrey’ had been a nickname from his days of pupillage which had stuck.

  “I’m going to show you a document kept by Roger Goodhart.” Holden revealed a single pink sheet of paper and three copies which he handed around. “Do you recognise the writing?”

  “Yes. It’s Mr Goodhart’s writing.”

  “And do you see the date? It’s the date of the accident, is it not?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “What is that document, Miss Carter?”

  “It’s a Sales Liaison Officer’s record of a call made to me.”

  “And it shows, does it not, a message with instructions for Mr Goodhart to make a call at Southampton in the afternoon, on his way back to Hastings?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you remember giving that message to Mr Goodhart?”

  “No, but I wouldn’t expect to. It’s a typical message.”

  “You would agree that it shows that, on the day of the accident, Mr Goodhart did receive instructions from the Company?”

  “Yes.”

  “Would you therefore accept that he did telephone you? That, in fact, your chart was never completed for some reason?”

  “It’s possible.”

  “Perhaps—I should say probably—because you heard of the accident and the chart was filed uncompleted, because his phone call in was irrelevant anyway?” There was quite a pause whilst Miss Carter thought about it.

  “We heard from the Police, during the morning, that Mr Goodhart was seriously injured, so I think it’s a very likely explanation.”

  “Thank you, Miss Carter.”

  There was no re-examination by Hambleton Jack who immediately started his final speech. Alistair Duncan was delighted. The point had been a small one—perhaps even peripheral—but it had been made nevertheless. The bundle of papers retrieved from the crashed car at Honiton had contained just one document which told the truth. It had killed, stone dead, Hambleton Jack’s clever questioning of Goodhart.

  Alistair Duncan listened to the closing speeches only fitfully. Nothing much turned on them. The Judge had probably made up his mind anyway and it looked suspiciously as if Sir Godfrey were even now drafting his Judgment. It was twelve-forty when Holden finally sat down and the Judge promptly adjourned proceedings, promising to give Judgment at two p.m.

  *

  The three lawyers lunched in a local steak house. Goodhart’s case was taboo. There was nothing to say anyway.

  At 2 p.m. Sir Godfrey began his Judgment. To someone unfamiliar with procedure it may seem strange that the decision is not announced in the first few words. Instead the Judge recites all the facts and findings creating a mounting and almost unbearable tension. Roger Goodhart sat biting the side of his thumb. Alice Goodhart looked detached.

  The lawyers jotted down the findings trying to isolate the straws in the wind as to the way in which the Judge’s mind was working. It was nearly twenty-five minutes before a crescendo approached. The solicitors for both sides started to write furiously.

  “And so I find,” continued the Judge, “that I am asked by the defendant to rely upon the evidence of Pierre Bouchin. I am afraid that I am totally unable to do so. I found his evidence wholly unreliable. His behaviour has left a great deal to be desired. He has deliberately destroyed the chart in the tachograph which would have provided unchallengeable evidence as to his speed up to impact. That evidence would have made my decision much easier.

  “He has lied as to his route. He has driven an illegal distance for the size of lorry. He has lied as to whether he rested on the boat or whether in fact he set out on the roads in England in an unfit condition.

  “I am satisfied that he was not fit to be in charge of a lorry having not slept for at least twenty-four hours. I make no specific finding as to the quantity of drink consumed but suspect that it was a substantial amount and, coupling that with the absence of sleep, a critical amount for a man in charge of such an awesome lorry as an articulated Volvo.”

  Duncan was writing feverishly and more illegibly with each favourable comment.

  “I find that, in contrast, Mr Goodhart was a truthful, decent witness, who did his best to tell this Court about those things which he could remember. It is a tragedy that he can remember nothing of the accident. It is a tragedy that he has suffered so grievously for his mistake. Anyone who has ever visited Stoke Mandeville will understand the meaning of this type of injury.

  “It is not disputed that some blame attaches to Mr Goodhart for he was on the wrong side of the road. The vital and difficult question is how much blame rests on Monsieur Bouchin? I have been helped by expert engineers. Needless to say, they take conflicting views, and, in the result, I have been unable to draw any conclusion from their evidence. They neutralise each other in this case.

  “I cannot say, on the balance of probabilities, that Pierre Bouchin could have stopped or swerved in time. On the other hand, neither can I say that he had no time in which to stop or swerve. In a matter of such split-second niceties, I can only say that as much as the experts have tried to assist me, nevertheless, I have found their evidence inconclusive.

  “Furthermore, I am not satisfied that Pierre Bouchin’s undoubted unfitness to drive played any part in this accident. That I have come to this conclusion is a matter for regret because the onus of proving blame rests on the plaintiff, Roger Goodhart, and his witnesses. The plaintiff himself could tell me nothing. His expert has not convinced me either. I must accept Monsieur Bouchin’s evidence that Roger Goodhart was on the wrong side of the road near a blind bend. I accept the evidence because it is corroborated.

  “In a persuasive speech, Mr Holden has invited me to find that Mr Goodhart’s negligence was, in effect, spent. I am afraid that the available evidence is insufficiently strong for me to reach that conclusion.

  “There being no other available evidence to show causative blame against Bouchin, and with no independent evidence to describe the manner of Monsieur Bouchin’s driving, I find, with reluctance, that the plaintiff has failed to prove any negligence. I therefore dismiss his case.”

  The reaction around the Courtroom was immediate. Alice Goodhart rose and walked stone-faced out of the Court. Roger Goodhart’s head slumped against his chest and then shook in disbelief. Alistair Duncan felt numb, too, staring wide-eyed at the words scribbled in front of him. But the two Q.C.s continued with clinical efficiency. They resolved the question of the orders for costs and legal aid taxation. Defeat is no stranger to even the greatest barrister, and Giles Holden’s brief was not concluded until all the formalities of the Courtroom had been resolved. At last Mr Justice Salford rose from his seat and retired, leaving the parties to gather up their books and pink-ribboned papers. Someone helped Roger Goodhart into the open air. Someone patted him on the back in consolation as the lawyers joined him.

  “No-one could have done any more” were Goodhart’s first words. “Thank you very much.”

  “I see no grounds for an Appeal,” the Q.C. advised. “Sir Godfrey’s findings were fair and reasonable. He had the evidence there to say that negligence was proved if he had wished but he chose to reject that evidence, despite Bouchin’s disastrous showin
g.”

  “So that’s the end then?”

  “Yes, I think so. So what now?”

  “I’ll have to get back to the Centre at Salisbury. As you know, it’s a retraining centre and when that’s finished I’ll go to some Sheltered Workshop.”

  “And what about Alice?” enquired Duncan.

  “She told me, at lunch time, that, win or lose, she was leaving me. The lure of damages wasn’t sufficient. I don’t blame her. She’s found life hard enough.” He lit a cigarette. “She confessed that she’s in love with an old friend of mine, Neil Masters. They plan to get married as soon as they can. She wants me to co-operate in the divorce. I’ve no doubt I will. Whatever you say.” He smiled at Alistair Duncan.

  “I’m very sorry,” said Holden.

  “No. Don’t be,” Goodhart replied. “Even if I had won, it would never have worked. She’d realised that she couldn’t face a lifetime of this.” He tapped his chair. “Money wouldn’t paper over the cracks and I can see now that I’ve been living in a dream world. She can have that divorce and I’ll see the children every other weekend. That’s the main thing—the only thing now. I’ll be getting my invalid car soon. Then I can visit them. The chair isn’t a barrier with them.” He flung the cigarette away. “They’ll give me all the happiness I need.” He broke down, sobbing, but quickly recovered his composure.

  “Well, goodbye, Mr Goodhart,” Giles Holden shook hands. “It doesn’t seem like it but you owe a lot to your solicitor.”

  “I know. I’m grateful to you all.” The barristers departed. Already their minds were on the next case. But for Duncan it was different. He made arrangements to drive his client back to the hostel at Salisbury. It would seem a long way.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight – BRISTOL

  The papers were full of the story next morning. The story had been syndicated to the nationals. What had been a short report after the first day became big news with the rejection of the claim and the Judge’s anger at the lorry driver.

  “Wheelchair to nowhere,” was one headline and “Riddle of Black Van leaves victim penniless,” read another. Yet another read, “Judge slams Juggernaut Driver.” In one, there was a picture of Bouchin. Another covered, in depth, the workings of tachographs.