The High Court has found that a prison officer’s personal injury proceedings against the Irish Prison Service and other defendants were statute barred, concluding that he had the necessary knowledge of his injury by October 2013 at the latest. The judgment says the defendants were entitled to succeed on their application to dismiss the claim as out of time.
The case concerned injuries Robert Mullins said he sustained while helping restrain and carry a prisoner to hospital on 8 January 2013. He said he hurt his back during the manoeuvre, was treated at the prison surgery and then saw his general practitioner, who certified him unfit for work for ten days. He had previously received treatment for back problems, and his GP initially considered the workplace incident had aggravated that pre-existing condition.
The defendants’ motion, issued in June 2017, sought dismissal on limitation grounds and raised other procedural issues. At the hearing in May 2018, they did not pursue the other issues and confined the application to whether the claim was brought too late.
Mullins argued that he did not understand the extent or nature of his injury until an MRI scan in November 2014 showed a right-sided disc protrusion at L5/S1. His medical reports also described right-sided leg pain after the incident as a new symptom. The court accepted that the scan was the first date on which he became aware of that specific disc finding, but held that a detailed diagnosis was not needed before proceedings could be issued.
The judge found that Mullins knew he had suffered a significant back injury linked to the workplace incident by the time of the incident, or at the latest by October 2013, when he said his condition had worsened to the point that he could not walk. The judgment notes that he had been off work, used medication and attended physiotherapy. It also records that his earlier back pain had settled substantially after treatment in 2012.
The court concluded that, by October 2013 at the latest, Mullins had the necessary knowledge under the limitation legislation, or must be deemed to have had it. His plenary summons was issued on 11 March 2016. The judgment therefore held the proceedings statute barred and stated that the defendants were entitled to succeed with the application. The supplied judgment ends at that conclusion and does not set out a separate formal order.