Application Under the Criminal Injuries Compensation Act 1983 and Karen Linda Durst [1993] ACTSC 11 (18 February 1993)

SUPREME COURT OF THE ACT

APPLICATION UNDER THE CRIMINAL INJURIES COMPENSATION ACT 1983 and KAREN LINDA
DURST
No. CIC 102 of 1991
Number of pages - 5

COURT

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE AUSTRALIAN CAPITAL TERRITORY
Master A. Hogan(1)

HEARING

CANBERRA, 10 December 1992
18:2:1993

Counsel for the Plaintiff: G. Lunney

Instructing Solicitors: Crossin Barker Gosling

Counsel for Defendant: P. Walker

Instructing Solicitors: Australian Government Solicitor

ORDER

1. Compensation be awarded to the applicant in the sum of $17,215

DECISION

MASTER A. HOGAN This is an application for compensation under the Criminal Injuries Compensation Act 1983.

2. On 9 October 1991 Douglas Bruce Fisher was indicted in this Court on a charge of detaining the applicant with intent to hold her for advantage.

3. On 27 February 1992 Ian Stuart King was indicated in this Court on a similar charge.

4. On 11 February 1991 Luke John Mitchell was indicted in this Court on a similar charge, and also on a count of administering an injurious substance to the applicant.

5. They were also each charged with offences against Brett Cranmer.

6. They all pleaded guilty. Fisher and King were given suspended sentences of 2 years imprisonment and Mitchell, being a young person, was committed to an institution for 2 years.

7. The applicant is a single lady, 24 years of age. She had met Fisher about the middle of 1988. He is a quadriplegic. They became friends, and although she was not romantically attracted to him, in November 1989 she agreed to a suggestion by him that he should move into her flat at Waramanga, partly as a protection for her. He, on the other hand, then professed to have formed an attachment for her.

8. Over the following year she found herself being called on to give him a great deal of care and support. He had a manipulative personality. Towards the end of 1990 she told him that at the end of the lease on the flat she wanted to end the arrangement. There was a distressing scene. Eventually he moved out and she moved to another address. He continued to try to approach her.

9. King was a friend of Fisher's whom the applicant had met. She did not know Mitchell.

10. On the evening of Saturday 3 November 1990 she was watching television at her new address with Brett Cranmer, a friend who was visiting. She answered a knock at the door, and King pushed his way in and began to punch Mr Cranmer. As she protested Mitchell entered the flat and took hold of her, placing his hand over her mouth. He removed his hand, still holding her, and a cloth with an anaesthetic was placed over her face. She lost consciousness.

11. She woke up in the rear seat of her car, with Cranmer and Mitchell in the front, and King beside her with the cloth.

12. He placed the cloth over her face and she lost consciousness again. She awoke for a short time in a car park, before losing consciousness again.

13. The next time she awoke the car was on a dirt track out past the Cotter Tavern. She saw Fisher's utility there.

14. King got Cranmer out of the car and assaulted him, and then dragged him by the arm into the bush. Fisher's utility started to move off, and King returned, without Cranmer, and drove after it, with the applicant still in the car. She again lost consciousness.

15. When she awoke Fisher told King to tie her up. He did not co-operate, so Fisher told Mitchell to do it. Her wrists, the tops of her legs and her ankles were bound, and the rope was wrapped around the driver's seat and steering wheel. The men then drove off in Fisher's utility, leaving her bound and alone in the car in the bush. She was terrified, and afraid that she might die.

16. She was left alone there for a time which should could not estimate. Later Fisher returned alone. While she was pleading with him to be untied two other young men arrived, but did not see the condition that she was in. After they left Fisher untied her. She got her car keys from his utility and drove off, till she saw the young men who were nearby. Fisher escaped in his vehicle and she went with the men to the police station to report what had happened.

17. This bizarre incident caused her extreme terror while it was happening. It took place over a number of hours. She was rendered unconscious a number of times. She saw her companion assaulted. She was taken by force to a remote place, tied up and left there. She had no idea what her assailants might or might not do to her. Naturally she was afraid for her life. She was so terrified of what might happen to her before she died that she attempted to swallow some bleach that was in her car, thinking it would be better to die that way than to be killed by her assailants.

18. Physically, she had some bruises to the body, and rope burns on her wrists. They cleared up soon afterwards. Psychologically, the trauma has been more long lasting.

19. The processes of prosecution of the offenders were long drawn out. She had to give evidence. She was afraid of being attacked again. She obtained a restraining order against Fisher from the Magistrates' Court.

20. She suffered from lack of sleep. She suffered migraine type headaches and nightmares. She was afraid to go out. She moved back to live with her mother for security. She went to her general practitioner, who gave her some sleeping tablets. At the suggestion of her solicitors she obtained a referral to Dr Tennant, psychiatrist, who saw her first in November 1991, a year after the kidnapping.

21. Dr Tennant had no doubt that she was still suffering from a post traumatic stress disorder. She had suffered depression. It was unfortunate that counselling had been delayed for so long, so that patterns of anxiety and fearfulness had become well established. She embarked on a course of counselling, seeing Dr Tennant at first at monthly intervals, then about once every two months.

22. In September 1992 Dr Tennant thought she was still exhibiting obvious symptoms of a post traumatic stress disorder. She expected continuing long term effects, with occasional flare ups which would be likely to require further psychiatric treatment.

23. The applicant expected, at the time of the hearing, that she would need at least another six months of treatment, or perhaps even another eighteen months.

24. She had returned to work, and her capacity to earn does not seem to have been affected.

25. She did not incur expense in treatment, as the doctors were paid by Medicare.

26. The Section 5 expenses are agreed at $215.00.

27. I think that a reasonable compensation for her pain and suffering would be the sum of $17,000.

28. I award compensation in the sum of $17,215.