AC-2024-LON-003241 - [2025] EWHC 3014 (Admin)

As to prejudice, the evidence of the Coroner is that had the issue been raised more promptly, steps would have been taken to retain the Inquest papers or ensure the availability of the Coroner in any challenge. I was not persuaded, however, that there had been any irreversible prejudice in those two specific requests.

I accept for the Interested Parties, and particularly for the two individuals, the continuation of a matter which they thought had been resolved, will be a source of ongoing stress. However, the court cannot be blind to the ongoing torment to the family, at least one element of which arises from their sense that no coroner’s jury has pronounced on what they regard as the important issue of Police responsibility.

However, it is also important to note that Sabina Rizvi was tragically murdered in 2003. There was a lengthy inquest with a jury, with publicly funded representation for the interested parties, and which followed an extensive evidence-gathering exercise, in February and March 2024. The campaign of the Rizvi family has already achieved much, with the individuals involved in these events subject to searching cross-examination in a public forum by teams of skilled advocates.

The effect of extending time for Mrs Rizvi’s application will be to prolong the legal uncertainty with regard to these events. If the application were to succeed, the only viable form of relief would be to re-hold the Inquest.

Factors (iii) and (iv) weigh strongly in favour of refusing the application for an extension of time. I accept that even if the application had been brought promptly, the effect of success would still have been further lengthy delay. Nonetheless, given the lapse of time since the tragic events which form the background to this application, it was obviously important to seek to move matters forward with the greatest possible expedition. That has not, I regret to say, been done.