Nottinghamshire County Council v LM & Anor

Facts

LM is a middle-aged man with a longstanding diagnosis of moderate intellectual disability, whose IQ has been assessed at between 52 and 60, and who has lived in a residential placement since 2017. He had a troubled childhood marked by violence, abuse and trauma, partial deafness and speech delay, and he later misused alcohol and cannabis. He has formed a number of relationships with both men and women, some highly intense and some online. Several allegations of criminal behaviour have been made against him; the most serious led to his conviction in 2009 for the anal rape and assault of a vulnerable man he knew, to which he pleaded guilty and for which he was made subject to a hospital order with restrictions under sections 37 and 41 of the Mental Health Act 1983. He is on the sex offenders register. Nottinghamshire County Council instituted these proceedings in 2024, principally because of concerns about LM's online activity and his increasingly dysfunctional approach to relationships. The parties agreed that LM lacks capacity as to litigation, care, residence, contact with others and internet and social media use. Two areas remained in dispute: capacity to engage in sexual relations, and capacity to share information about his sexual offending. The public bodies contended he lacked capacity in both; the Official Solicitor, adopting the evidence of the jointly instructed consultant forensic psychiatrist, contended the presumption of capacity had not been displaced.