Page 33 - When Things Go Wrong

Special Procedure Inquest

2.40 Our recommendations for a Central Inquiries Unit and the expansion of the
Office of the Chief Coroner will contribute to improving the establishment and
management of inquests and inquiries. However, neither will address the
duplication of process across inquests and inquiries, nor the inability of
inquests to investigate multiple asynchronous deaths, causatively linked by
systemic failure.

2.41 As such, the Working Party recommends the establishment of a new
special procedure inquest, in order to investigate both mass fatalities and
single deaths causatively linked through systemic failure. It is a “fused” model,
combining what we consider to be the most successful features for effective
participation of inquests and public inquiries.

2.42 We are grateful to Sir Peter Thornton QC for leading development and
adaption of the model over the life of our work.

Duplication of process

2.43 Under Schedule 1 of the 2009 Act, a coroner must suspend an inquest when
requested by a prosecuting agency on the grounds of a potential criminal
80
charge; where they become aware that a person has been charged with a
homicide offence involving the death of the deceased; and where the Lord
81
Chancellor requests the coroner to do so on the ground that the cause of death
82
is likely to be adequately investigated by a current or future statutory inquiry.
The coroner also has a general power to suspend an investigation into a
person’s death in any case if it appears to the coroner that it would be
appropriate to do so. However, despite the operation of these provisions,
83
most of our consultees felt that there is no practical benefit in opening two

80 Coroners and Justice Act 2009, sch 1, para 1(2).
81 Ibid, para 2 (2).
82 Ibid, para 3.
83 Ibid, para 5.
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