#freedom-of-person #human-rights #public

R (on the application of Amin) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2003] UKHL 51

An inmate of Feltham Young Offenders' Institution ('YOI'), Zahid Mubarek, was murdered by his cellmate. The Home Office declined to hold a full public enquiry on the basis that there had been a prison investigation, an enquiry by the Commission for Racial Equality, and a criminal trial. In reviewing this case, the House of Lords emphasised the importance of the state's duty to protect life, particularly of those involuntarily in custody, stressing that reasonable care must be taken to safeguard their lives. Further, they re-stated the importance of the state's obligation under the ECHR, art 2 to investigate deaths involving agents of the state. The applicable state agent in this case was the regime at the YOI that had placed the deceased in a cell with a known violent racist. Their Lordships specified that, whilst there was no single template for such investigations, there was an irreducible core at the heart of the article 2 duty: the investigation must be public, independent and involve the full participation of the family. Such an investigation had not taken place in this case and this was therefore seen to represent a violation of the ECHR, art 2.