Education worker compensated after assault by pupil
A woman who was employed at a school for children with behavioural problems was recently successful in her compensation claim, following an incident at the school in which she was assaulted by a pupil. The pupil was known for his problematic aggressive behaviour; however, no special provisions were made by the school’s management to ensure that the woman remained safe around the pupil.
The school specialised in dealing with children with learning difficulties and challenging behaviour. The woman’s rôle at the school involved caring for these children; among these duties, if one of the pupils needed to go to hospital for treatment for any reason, staff were to accompany them, so as to ensure that the children were never left unsupervised.
Under the school’s normal policy, this care was to be provided by 2 members of staff to each child, taking into consideration the problem behaviour of the children. However, due to staffing issues at the school, on this occasion the woman was forced to accompany the pupil alone. The boy, 15 years old, had a well-documented history of aggressive behaviour and violent outbursts, which was well known by the school.
After having been hospitalised for a number of days, the boy suddenly became extremely agitated. The woman, who was quite well experienced with dealing with this sort of behaviour, began to attempt to calm him down; however, these efforts proved unsuccessful, as the boy grew more and more agitated, before he finally erupted with violence, attacking the woman, injuring her shoulder and her chest.
Following the attack, she found herself unable to drive as normal, as well as being unable to attend work. During the process of healing her injuries, she had to be looked after by members of her family.
After she had fully recovered from her injuries, she began to look into making a compensation claim for her injuries. She felt that the school had failed to fully ensure her safety, as they had a responsibility to. She therefore got into contact with a no win no fee firm of solicitors, who agreed to represent her in her case.
Her solicitors successfully argued in court that the fact that the woman had been expected to supervise the child entirely alone constituted a clear case of professional negligence, as the school clearly had a safety policy stating that 2 members of staff should accompany children, and had decided to act entirely out of keeping with this procedure.
The judge ruled that the school was responsible for the woman’s injuries, as if they had ensured that they were acting in accordance with their own health & safety guidelines, this injury would never have occurred. He stated that, had there been 2 qualified supervisors in the room at the time, as there should have been, then the incident would not have occurred in the way that it did.
If you have suffered a similarly preventable injury that you feel your employer is responsible for, you could be entitled to make a claim for compensation
Updated on 11/22/2010