Cathryn Craven, pictured, won more than £100,000 at the High Court after suing the driver who killed her estranged husband in a crash, claiming the couple were going to reconcile
A woman who was divorcing her husband at the time he was killed by a speeding driver has been awarded £101,514 in compensation at the High Court.
Cathryn Craven, 50, initially brought a claim of nearly £700,000 damages against Terry Davies after the fatal collision in Coventry in June 2014 on behalf of the couple’s three children and herself.
She launched the claim arguing she was going to get back together with her estranged husband Jayson, 48, before his death.
Although the judge ruled the chances of reconciliation were ‘no more than a speculative possibility’ he awarded the damages because it amounted to what she would have received in maintenance payments after the divorce.
Davies was jailed for four years at Coventry Crown Court in 2015, having been convicted of causing Mr Craven’s death by dangerous driving.
At the time of Mr Craven’s death, he and his wife were in a ‘cooling-off period’ between decree nisi pronouncement and decree absolute.
After a relationship of nearly 30 years, they separated in January 2014 after Mr Craven began an affair, and Mrs Craven petitioned for divorce.
Lawyers for Mrs Craven argued at a hearing in April that there was an ’80 per cent chance’ they were going to reconcile.
Mr Davies’s representatives told the court the marriage was ‘doomed’ and the divorce being finalised was ‘highly probable’, but Judge Freedman ruled in favour of Mrs Craven.
Mr Craven, 48, died instantly when he was hit as he crossed Fletchamstead Highway in the early hours in June 2014.
Davies, who was travelling at 86mph in a 40mph zone, was later found guilty of causing death by dangerous driving and jailed for four years.
Her case was that, had he not been killed, her anger was likely to have been eased by the passage of time because she ‘loved him deeply’ and her desire for divorce would have ‘lessened to the point of extinction by realisation of the financial consequences’.
In a ruling made public on Thursday, the judge said that the whole family was devastated by Mr Craven’s untimely death.
Motorist Terry Davies, left, was jailed in 2015 over the crash which killed Jayson Craven, right, instantly. But the High Court judge ruled reconciliation was only a ‘speculative possibility’ and awarded Mrs Craven £100,000 in lieu of maintenance payments she would have received
However, although Mrs Craven still loved him, it was clear that she no longer felt able or wanted to live in the same household.
The marriage had been in trouble for some considerable time before the separation and the evidence was clear that, by November 2013, she had had enough.
She was determined to proceed with the divorce and would have done so, whatever advice she received, whether financial or otherwise, he added.
‘In these circumstances, regrettably, I am unable to find that there was a significant chance that, but for his death, the deceased and the claimant would have been reconciled.’
His view was that the chances of the marriage being saved were ‘no more than a speculative possibility’.
The judge said it followed that Mrs Craven’s claim for loss of financial dependency was limited to what she would have received by way of maintenance payments.
Together with other sums covering bereavement, funeral expenses and awards to the children, the total damages amounted to £101,514.