A woman known as “Sarah” has successfully overturned an appeal under the Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme. The First Tier Tribunal had made a 40% reduction in her award for compensation because she had retracted an allegation of rape against her abuser. The FTT found that “she was capable of making an autonomous decision not to proceed with her complaint”, therefore the reduction would be applied.
The Upper Tribunal overturned that decision and said no deduction should have been made. The FTT had wrongly focussed on whether Sarah had been acting “autonomously”.
Adam Wagner assisted Women Against Rape who made submissions to the Upper Tribunal about the general context to rape victims applying for compensation under the scheme.
