England and Wales Court of Appeal (Civil Division) Decisions

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE
COURT OF APPEAL (CIVIL DIVISION) ;
ON APPEAL FROM HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT
(Mr JUSTICE MOSES)

		Royal Courts of Justice Strand London WC2 Wednesday, 16th May 2001

Wednesday, 16th May 2001

1. LORD JUSTICE LONGMORE: Dr Saxena appears before the Court this morning seeking permission to appeal from two separate decisions of the High Court, first from the decision of Moses J on 27th July 2000 in respect of four applications that he brings for judicial review, and second, from the decision of Hooper J in respect of two applications for judicial review.
2. It is apparent that Dr Saxena feels extremely strongly about what happened to him while he was in the custody of the Prison Service, and all the applications stem from that. He has elaborated in front of me this morning further complaints about how, as he puts it, the Prison Service tried to kill him, tried to torture him and then has cooked up the responses to the complaints that he has made. That brings me to his complaints.
3. The four, as dealt with by Moses J, were, firstly, complaint number 2236 that his post was not being forwarded to him. Moses J dealt with that by saying that was a difficulty with the Post Office, which is not a decision made by an administrative body which is capable of being resolved by judicial review. I do not think there is any prospect of the Court of Appeal interfering with that decision.
4. Complaint number 2237 relates to an incident when Dr Saxena was being transferred from one prison to another and he has complaints about how he was treated by Group 4 during that transfer. Moses J pointed out that that was investigated by Group 4 and, indeed, one sees their response to the complaint made on 27th April 2000. Once again, there is no decision there that is susceptible to judicial review.
5. Complaint number 2239 is a complaint about an attack by a fellow prisoner. Of course it is extremely regrettable that Dr Saxena should have been attacked by a fellow prisoner. It is something which the Prison Services should take precautions to ensure does not happen, but even in the best regulated prison service this does sometimes occur. The prisoner concerned was a Mr McWilliams, and after Dr Saxena had made his complaint that was investigated by a Mr Hewitson who said in a letter dated 17th April 2000 that Mr McWilliams had been interviewed and the complaint could not be substantiated. He added "However, I do take note of the fact that you are now located on different Houseblocks", so at least the Prison Service was able to ensure that Dr Saxena was no longer in a position to be attacked by Mr McWilliams. Once again there is no decision of administrative authority which could be susceptible of judicial review and there is no possibility of any successful appeal.
6. The fourth matter dealt with by Moses J, number 2240, was a complaint about delay in money being transferred to Dr Saxena's account. That was the subject matter of a complaint that was dealt with by the assistant governor in a letter of 13th June 2000. Once again it is impossible to see that there is any decision there which could be susceptible of judicial review. If, at the end of the day, Dr Saxena has not received money that is due to him, that is a matter for civil proceedings for a civil debt.
7. Moses J was unable to deal with two further applications of Dr Saxena because they did appear, on the face of the matter, to relate to decisions of the Prison Service in the form of adjudications, and therefore Moses J considered it right to adjourn those two complaints to a further hearing at which the Treasury Solicitor would be entitled to attend and explain to the Court what the position about those apparent adjudications were.
8. These two adjudications, of which Dr Saxena complained, form the complaints in relation to his application for judicial review, numbers 2093 and 2241. The first of those was the apparent charge against Dr Saxena that he refused to be located in his allocated cell; second, that he refused a lawful order to perform a strip search.After the Home Office had been asked to attend, it then became apparent that neither of those adjudications were in fact proceeded with and one sees in the documentation that the words "not proceeded with" appear across the page. In the light of that it is clear that there are no adjudications, and it is only an adjudication which can properly be a subject matter of judicial review. The matter came before Hooper J and he refused Dr Saxena permission to move for judicial review because there just were no adjudications, and so there was nothing for the court to supervise.
9. I, of course, have looked at all the material again. I can see no prospect of Dr Saxena persuading the Court of Appeal that Hooper J was wrong in relation to those matters and, therefore, I have to dismiss his applications for permission to appeal in relation to those two matters as well as his application for permission to appeal the matters which were decided by Moses J.
(Application for permission to appeal refused)