Court reduces award to private car owner over TA illegal seizure
Published:Sunday | March 8, 2020 | 12:15 AM
The Court of Appeal agrees that Amy Hyacinth Bogle deserves to be compensated for the illegal seizure of her car by the Transport Authority, TA, which then lost the vehicle somehow.
But it diverged from the Supreme Court on the degree of the monetary award.
The state agency seized the vehicle, after one of its own collided with it, having alleged that Bogle was illegally operating it as public transport – a claim she denied and the court rejected.
She sued the Transport Authority back in May 2012 after discovering that the agency had mislaid her car. The Supreme Court awarded her $10.84 million, but the appellate court, in a judgement handed down on February 28 chopped it down to $6.36 million – a more than 40 per cent revision – after the Transport Authority appealed the case.
Bogle’s lawyer Dr Garth Lyttle told the Financial Gleaner last Wednesday that while his client was not satisfied with the judgement that was recently delivered by the appeal court, she would not contest the award.
The case stemmed from a February 15, 2011 collision along Waltham Park Road in Kingston, involving Bogle’s motor vehicle, a Toyota Mark II, and another owned by the Transport Authority and driven by one of its inspectors.
After the collision, the Transport Authority inspectors seized Bogle’s car, and issued her with a warning for prosecution for operating without a road licence and having no public passenger vehicle insurance in contravention of the Road Traffic Act. The written warning issued by TA Inspector Pauline Saunders indicated that they would be taking the car to the Lyndhurst Road pound in Kingston. Bogle said she was subsequently served with two summonses requiring her to attend court on March 8, 2011.
Bogle’s car was ordered released to her on bond at her first appearance in the traffic court. The case against her was dismissed a year later as no evidence was presented by the crown.
However, Bogle’s car was never released to her despite the early court order, and no one at the Transport Authority could tell her of its whereabouts.
Lyttle, her lawyer, wrote to the Transport Authority requesting compensation for loss of use of the vehicle. Bogle subsequently sued the Transport Authority in the Supreme Court.
According to the Court of Appeal judgment written by Justice Jennifer Straw and joined by Justices Hilary Phillips and David Fraser, TA route inspectors Lloyd Bowen and Pauline Saunders gave evidence that they observed Bogle transporting passengers and collecting fares, without the requisite licence, on the day of the seizure.
However, Bogle denied the charge and testified that the TA vehicle collided with hers while being driven on the wrong side of the road. Supreme Court Justice Kirk Anderson rejected the account given by the inspectors and ruled that the TA had seized the vehicle illegally.
Anderson awarded Bogle $10.84 million in compensation, having reduced it from the $12 million her lawyer had argued for. The overall award included general and special damages.
At the appellate level, the court knocked down the award to $6.36 million, based on computations of receipts tendered into evidence relating to Bogle’s expenses for daily rental of a comparable vehicle. The justices also awarded interest of three per cent dating from May 14, 2012, when the claim was first served for the lawsuit.
Attorney Leslie Campbell who represented the Transport Authority was not reached for comment.