Ex-soldier loses £1m damages bid

An ex-soldier from Worcestershire who claimed the Army was negligent in treating mental trauma he had suffered has lost a £1m compensation bid.

Stephen Hibbert, 40, from Kidderminster, says he was left traumatised after tours in Bosnia and Northern Ireland in the early 1990s.

His lawyers told London's High Court his psychiatric condition has become "entrenched" because it was untreated.

But Mr Justice Owen dismissed claims that Army care had been negligent.

He told London's High Court it was impossible not to feel "the greatest sympathy" for Mr Hibbert, who had "loyally served his country", but he said he was a victim of stresses to which serving soldiers can be exposed.

And this was "not due to any culpable want of care" by the Ministry of Defence, he said.

First tour

Mr Hibbert joined the former Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters Regiment aged 16, after being in the cadets.

His legal team said on his first tour of duty in Ulster his accommodation block had come under fire by the IRA.

Then while serving with the Cheshire Regiment in Bosnia in 1993, he witnessed further traumas. Among them was recovering the mutilated bodies of civilians, including children, who were killed in Vitez.

Mr Hibbert's legal team said an Army psychiatrist he saw in May and June 1994 failed to treat his psychiatric condition and he was now unable to work.

However, the judge concluded that the claim for damages should be dismissed.