Archinect
anchor

UK Practice Legal Responsibility

t a z

Can anyone translate how criminal charges can be brought in a case like this? The operable portion of a window vent on a tower under construction fell out and hit and killed a pedestrian.

Do UK architects have liability exposure for site safety?

Foster + Partners court appearance over 2018 tower death is delayed

 
Nov 1, 24 2:39 pm
graphemic

Bizarre. I am also curious. 

At least in the US, wouldn't they have to prove that an F+P employee saw and documented an issue with that specific window but chose not to tell to the owner/builder? 

Nov 1, 24 3:15 pm  · 
 · 
t a z

I can't think of any comparable life safety cases that made the news in the US... In civil lawsuits everyone and their mother is named, but for a state to file criminal charges would be another thing entirely.

Nov 1, 24 4:32 pm  · 
 · 
t a z

*site safety

Nov 1, 24 5:23 pm  · 
 · 
pj_heavy

it’s not uncommon for this kind of incident ; facade eng, builder and a client were also charged. Wait and see how this case would pan out. The only hope for facade eng and architect to get away with this is faulty installation by the builder .

Nov 1, 24 5:57 pm  · 
 · 
graphemic

Are you saying it's common for architects to face legal consequences in this kind of event? I think that's what we're curious about, do you have any sources? Cause I don't understand what the legal mechanism would be.

Nov 1, 24 6:30 pm  · 
 · 
pj_heavy

https://amp.theguardian.com/uk-news/article/2024/sep/04/police-under-pressure-to-accelerate-criminal-investigation-into-grenfell-fire / Though I misread the keyword ‘ criminal charge ‘ when I responded to this post. My comment was mainly to do with financial liability for losses and damages of faulty design /material.

Nov 1, 24 7:00 pm  · 
 · 
graphemic

Ah yeah, I mean. Grenfell is a whole other stratosphere of industry-wide negligence. Architects should absolutely charged in that case. I'm more curious about construction safety. There are so many injuries and deaths on job sites everywhere all the time, so I feel like we would hear about it more if architects were ever involved in those suits.

Nov 1, 24 7:56 pm  · 
 · 

Block this user


Are you sure you want to block this user and hide all related comments throughout the site?

Archinect


This is your first comment on Archinect. Your comment will be visible once approved.

  • ×Search in: