J S Naicker

On the court record

J S Naicker appears in the corpus in personal-injury and road-accident litigation, argued in the High Court (Mahkamah Tinggi), with matters running from the admission of fresh evidence on appeal to fatal-accident dependency claims and the preservation of judgment sums pending appeal. In one matter, appearing for the respondent, the court considered an application to admit fresh evidence at the appellate stage under Order 55 rule 7(a) of the Rules of Court 2012, applying the settled requirements that the evidence was not available at the trial in the subordinate court and could not have been obtained with reasonable diligence, and that, if true, it would have had or would have been likely to have a determining influence on the decision below — an insurer being among the parties. A second matter, appearing for the respondent, was a fatal road-accident dependency claim brought by the spouse and children of a deceased motorcyclist under section 7 of the Civil Law Act 1956 for loss of dependency, bereavement and expenses, together with a claim for the benefit of the estate under section 8, and turned on whether the appellants had discharged the burden of showing negligence, what weight should be given to the investigating officer's opinion, and how the loss of dependency should be assessed. A third matter, appearing for the appellant, concerned an application for a preservation order and a stay of execution of a Sessions Court judgment sum pending appeal in a motorcycle-accident claim, and raised whether special circumstances existed, whether refusal would cause irreparable prejudice not compensable in damages, and the propriety of a solicitor disbursing a judgment sum to a client before the court's decision. A common thread is that the outcome of each matter depended less on the bare fact of the collision than on questions of proof and procedure — what fresh evidence may be received on appeal, how the burden of showing negligence is discharged, and whether a judgment sum should be preserved while an appeal is pending. Across the appearances the practice is concentrated on accident and fatal-accident litigation and on the appellate and enforcement procedure that surrounds it.