Criminal sues for £5m after stabbing in jail canteen ‘ left him with fear of kitchens’
A CAREER criminal left with a phobia of kitchens after being stabbed 16 times in a jail canteen is demanding £5million in compensation from the Ministry of Justice.
Steven Wilson suffered a torn liver, fractured spine and lacerated spinal cord in the attack by another inmate.
He later sued, claiming the MoJ failed to adequately assess if it was safe for convicted murderer Patrick Chandler to work in the kitchen, where he had access to knives and sharp objects.
The ministry admitted liability
‘Compensation must be fair’
for the attack and agreed that Wilson was due compensation.
But government lawyers argue that because the burglar, 36, had a 20-year criminal record with ‘next to no history’ of having any honest earnings, he should not get the millions he is demanding.
At the High Court Judge Melissa Clarke was told that Wilson was on remand for an aggravated burglary – for which he was later convicted and sentenced to six and a half years – when he was attacked at Chelmsford jail in Essex.
His attacker was 24 days into a life sentence for a knife murder when he launched the attack ‘out of the blue’ in July 2018.
Chandler later admitted attempting to murder Wilson and received an additional life sentence and ten-year minimum term.
His overall risk rating had been assessed by the MoJ as ‘medium’, court documents disclosed, even though two weeks before the attack he allegedly told his supervisor that ‘ he had fantasised about violence and what he was going to do to people and about making weapons’.
Wilson’s barrister, Giles Mooney KC, told the judge that, once off the operating table, he was treated in hospital for more than two months and had to use a wheelchair. He now needs a stick to get around, is plagued by chronic pain and cannot work due to the legacy of the prison attack, his lawyers say.
‘When I see knives I feel cold,’ Wilson said from the witness box. ‘You don’t understand the chill I get when I see a knife. I can’t be in a kitchen or around knives because it reminds me of the attack.’
Richard Wheeler, barrister for the MoJ, said: ‘While the defendant accepts the claimant must be compensated for his injuries, that compensation must be fair, reasonable and just.’
He said the £5million payout being sought would be ‘out of accord with what society would perceive as being reasonable given the claimant’s background and lifestyle before the assault’.
The KC added that Wilson, of Clacton, Essex, had a lengthy record, including for criminal damage, theft and violence.
He also said that a claim for lost future income of £365,000 was too high, given there was ‘next to no history of legitimate earnings’.
The case continues.