A kickboxer weighing 16 stone who claimed he fell through an 18-inch hole at work could face jail after a judge dismissed his £30,000 compensation bid.
Stuart Mann, 39, was ‘highly unlikely’ to have plunged through a hole measuring just 18 by 12 inches, into which he could hardly fit his burly body, said Judge Mark Gargan, rejecting his tale as being ‘like something out of a comic strip’.
Mann, a ‘strongly built’ Thai boxer, told a doctor over two years after his supposed fall that he was still ‘too disabled to do housework’ while at the same time boasting to a physio that he was training for a fight and ‘doing 50 high kicks a day with each leg’, the court heard.
Stuart Mann, 39, from Hartlepool, County Durham, pictured outside High Court in London. The 16-stone kickboxer had claimed he fell through an 18-inch hole at work
Mann, a ‘strongly built’ Thai boxer, could now be jailed for up to two years after permission was granted to the company he worked for to seek to have him sentenced for contempt of court
Evidence showed he had been back fighting over 18 months before he lied to the doctor, the judge said.
Judge Gargan dismissed his compensation claim as being ‘fundamentally dishonest’ at Middlesbrough County Court in February last year, finding he had cooked up the story after stumbling up some stairs and suffering minor injuries that cleared up within six months.
Mann, from Hartlepool, County Durham, could now be jailed for up to two years after High Court Judge Graham Robinson granted permission to insurers, for the demolition company he worked for, to seek to have him sentenced for contempt of court.
The insurers, Aspen Insurance UK Ltd, are set to ask for Mann, who was working through an agency, to foot a £100,000 court bill.
On 24 June 2014 Mann was working for a demolition company knocking down a former school in Milton Road, Stoke on Trent, the High Court heard.
He claimed he fell through a narrow 18-by-12-inch hole, plunging between eight and 16ft into a basement, injuring his back and ribs, adding he was then stuck in the basement with no doors or stairs, having to be tied to a ladder and pulled out by fellow workers.
But while accepting he had an accident, the demolition company denied he fell down a hole, saying plans showed there was not even a basement under the room where he claimed to have fallen.
The site supervisor gave evidence at the county court, suggesting he had stumbled while walking up some stairs and suffered minor rib injuries.
The 16-stone boxer told a doctor over two years he was still ‘too disabled to do housework’, while telling a physio he was ‘doing 50 high kicks a day with each leg’, the court heard
Dismissing his claim, Judge Gargan said: ‘Stuart Mann is a strongly built man who stands five foot 11 inches. He is now about 100kg (15 stone 10.5lb).
‘I do not say that it is impossible that he would have fitted through a hole the size that he describes, but what he is asking the court to accept happened is really something out of a comic strip film or comic book.’
Although Mr Mann may not have been as broad at the time of the accident, as he claimed he was ‘fighting fit’ then, he was still a ‘strongly built man’, said the judge.
He added: ‘It is highly unlikely…that he managed to get so completely over the hole that he was able to fall straight through despite only just fitting through it.’
The judge also said it was ‘highly unlikely’ he would suffer rib injuries, but no injuries to his feet or legs, despite it being claimed on his behalf that his feet might not have been injured because he was wearing ‘good solid work boots.’
He told the court: ‘How do you get a strongly built man out of a basement when the floor is eight to 16 feet above and when on Mr Mann’s account there are no stairs or doors? The answer to that is, one would anticipate, with extreme difficulty.
‘On his case they have managed to get the ladder through the 12 by 18-inch hole…and he has been somehow pushed up the ladder through the hole.
‘That sounds to me remarkably difficult and again highly unlikely.’
Of his lies to the doctor, he said Mann told a physio he was in training for a fight, but just three days later told a doctor he couldn’t do housework.
Mann (pictured right) must have fully recovered by February 2015, when he attended a minor injuries unit after twisting his knee doing a switch kick in training, said Judge Gargan
He said: ‘Mr Mann’s case is that he was significantly disabled for a lengthy period after the accident.
‘He told (a doctor on 29 November 2016) that he had not been able to return to work…that he experienced constant pain, which varied in severity from day to day, that he could no longer perform any housework, even light duties, that he was a keen Thai boxer but had not been able to return to this and that he had not attended a gymnasium since his accident.
‘The physiotherapy notes show the examination took place…when he had a fight arranged.
‘Mr Mann was high-kicking on 26 November, according to the physiotherapy notes…50 kicks with each leg.
‘That does not fit well with how he was presenting himself to the doctor.’
He said Mann must have fully recovered by February 2015, when he attended a minor injuries unit after twisting his knee doing a switch kick in training.
The judge added his injuries would have seen him taking six weeks off work and suffering ‘at the most six months gyp’ due to soft tissue injuries.
He continued: ‘In my judgment, it is clear that Mr Mann’s evidence about the accident itself must be fundamentally dishonest, because the circumstances of the accident are wholly fundamental to this and I have found that he had the accident falling up a set of steps when he said he had it falling into a hole.
‘That must be dishonest, it cannot be an innocent mistake. Mr Mann has given an account to the doctor which is very different to that which he was giving to the physiotherapist at exactly the same time…I do not see how that can be anything other than dishonest.’
Geoffrey Brown, for the insurer, asked Judge Robinson to grant permission to bring contempt of court proceedings for which Mann could face up to two years over the ‘findings of fundamental dishonesty’ made in the county court.
But Michael Cahill, for Mann, told the court he denies all allegations of dishonesty, despite Judge Gargan’s findings, and is sticking to his story about the accident and its impact on him.
Judge Robinson allowed the committal action to go forward, saying: ‘There are thirty separate allegations of dishonesty… The judge found he lied.
‘The alleged contempt would have to be proved to the criminal standard, but it seems to be there is at least a prima facie case.
‘The public interest test is passed. There is hard evidence that increasing numbers of false claims are being brought.
‘Lies are easy to make and sometimes hard to disprove. It is important that cases like this are permitted to proceed, because false claims cost insurance companies a great deal of money.
‘I grant permission for this application to proceed to a full hearing (in respect of) what are alleged to be lies told… by Mr Mann in the course of his damages claim.’
The contempt case will now go for trial back in Middlesbrough and is set to be heard in July this year.