Torture victims were wrongly imprisoned in UK, high court rules (Guardian) (11 October 2017)

The Public Law and Immigration teams at Duncan Lewis challenged the Home Office’s definition of torture which has unlawfully detained victims of torture in UK detention centres. The High Court ruled in favour of the challenge on 10th October 2017. Mr Justice Ouseley told the Home Office that their policy had ‘no rational or evidence base.’ The unlawful definition required a torture victim to have received torture by state actors in order to be considered victims of torture. Those vulnerable persons who experienced non-state torture were unlawfully detained under this policy. Toufique Hossain, Public Law and Immigration Director at Duncan Lewis is quoted: “What is particularly shocking in this case, is that the secretary of state developed a policy, completely at odds with responsible medical opinion and established legal standards, that treated people who suffered abhorrent torture differently, simply on the basis of who their torturer was.”