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Last week we reported that a third company, Lion Steel Limited,
had been convicted of corporate manslaughter under the Corporate
Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007. Sentencing was passed
on 20 July 2012 with a fine of £480,000 making it the largest
fine to date, albeit still below the £500,000 starting point
stipulated in guidance.
This case was of particular interest as it is generally felt
that the legislation and relative guidance has not yet been fully
tested on a larger scale company such as Lion Steel. By way of
analysis Cotswold Geotechnical Holdings were the first company to
be convicted under the legislation. Due to the financial
difficulties Cotswold were facing, and with an annual turnover of
only £300,000, they were fined £385,000 payable over
ten years. They went into liquidation shortly after. The conviction
of JMW Farms Limited (Co. Armagh) did not provide any clarity on
the stance the courts will adopt as they had a significantly higher
annual turnover of over £1million, were in good health but
yet only attracted a fine of £187,500 plus £13,000 in
costs. There was a reduction of 25% to reflect the fact that they
pled guilty but it is not entirely clear why the starting point was
so far below the guidance in the first place.
This article was written for Law-Now, CMS Cameron
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give professional or legal advice. All Law-Now information relates
to circumstances prevailing at the date of its original publication
and may not have been updated to reflect subsequent
developments.
The original publication date for this article was
20/07/2012.
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