The Western Cape High Court has dismissed a widow’s application to claim financial support from the Road Accident Fund (RAF) after her husband took his own life two years after he was involved in a car crash.
The court found that his death was not directly caused by the accident that left him physically disabled, and therefore the RAF could not be held liable for the family’s loss of support claim.
The deceased was involved in the crash in 2014. A claim was lodged at the Pretoria high court in 2016, but in December that year he died while the matter was still pending before the court.
“On January 17 2018, the first respondent, Ms L[...] M[...] (Mrs LM), the widow of the deceased, instituted a claim arising from the deceased’s death against the RAF in the Western Cape division of the High Court, Cape Town. She claimed loss of support in her personal capacity and in her representative capacity as natural guardian and mother on behalf of her minor daughters,” according to the judgment by a full bench.
On April 14 2022, the trial court dismissed the claim, finding that the family had failed to prove a factual link between the injuries sustained in the accident and the deceased’s death.
The court noted that the deceased had never been diagnosed with major depressive disorder and ruled that without evidence of a recognised mental illness or disorder, it could not conclude that his death was directly caused by the crash injuries.
The family was later granted leave to appeal before the full bench of the division.
On October 11 2023, the full bench upheld the appeal with costs, overturning the trial court’s ruling and ordering the RAF to compensate the family for damages they may later prove.
The court accepted expert opinion evidence that had previously been rejected by the trial court and found that the deceased’s death was linked to the wrongful conduct that caused his injuries.
It further held that a formal diagnosis of mental illness was not necessary to establish factual causation and found that the available evidence was enough to support the claim. However, the court did not deal with the issue of legal causation.
The RAF was later granted special leave to appeal the full bench ruling.
During the appeal proceedings, several witnesses testified, including the deceased’s mother, Mrs SB, who described how her son changed after the accident.
“She explained that he often expressed frustration and anger about his physical limitations and that he had, not long before his suicide, said that he had had enough. She was concerned about him. The deceased, however, would not admit that he needed assistance. He would simply get on with coping with his circumstances,” the judgment reads.
Before overturning the order directing the RAF to compensate the widow, judge G Goosen and his colleagues acknowledged the emotional weight of the matter.
“As much as legal principles must be brought to bear in a case such as this, the consequences of suicide are always tragic and distressing. However sympathetic we might be to the innocent survivors of the tragedy, the claim cannot be sustained. In the circumstances, the appeal must succeed,” he said
Sowetan
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