A woman goes to the House of Lords today to seek compensation from the man who was convicted of her attempted rape and who, on his release, won £7 million on the National Lottery.

The case of the so-called lotto rapist raises a question of natural justice; but it also challenges the law as to when people should be able to sue and when such claims should be ruled out of time.

Iorworth Hoare was sentenced in 1989 to life imprisonment for the attempted rape of Mrs A, a retired teacher now 77. He had dragged her from a path in a park in Leeds and subjected her to a “violent and disgusting” attack. She was awarded just £5,000 from the Criminal Injuries Board. But Hoare, when out on day-release from prison in 2004, scooped £7 million on the lottery. He was freed on parole later that year.

Now in a test case in the highest court in the land, Mrs A is seeking to pursue a civil claim for damages against Hoare for the assault and battery and psychiatric injury she suffered. Why should her attacker enjoy the benefits of a win on the lottery? Yet it is not, she insists, about money, more about a just result.

But as the law stands, Mrs A’s claim is time-barred because it was not brought within the six-year limitation period after the attack. She took her case to the High Court and Court of Appeal and both have ruled against her.

What her lawyers will argue, however, is that the law is inconsistent: where civil claims are brought generally, including those for damages for personal injury, the limitation period is only three years. But judges have discretion to extend that in circumstances where it would be just to do so. The discretion covers cases of claims over personal injuries — but not claims involving deliberate assault, where the period is fixed for six years.

Damian Crosse, a partner at DLA Piper, who acts for Mrs A, said: “We want to see a change in the law to ensure that Mrs A is fairly compensated for the damage and suffering she has had to endure as a result of being attacked by Mr Hoare.” People like her, he says, should be able to gain justice through the civil courts, adding: “There is clearly an anomaly in the law that is preventing them from do so.”

Had the claim been issued within six years of the date of the attack, there is no doubt that she would have been successful in her civil claim against Mr Hoare, he adds. Yet Mrs A was caught in the double bind that she was unable to bring a claim within the six-year period because at that time her attacker had no money. As lawyers say, there is no point pursuing a claim if it is not worth “the powder and shot”.

Mrs A’s lawyers will argue that in cases such as hers, of intentional assault, courts should have the same discretion to extend the time-bar. Their view is in line with proposals from the Law Commission, which has said that the current law is inflexible and recommended a uniform three-year limitation period that can be extended when courts think right in individual cases.

Mr Crosse argues: “It seems ridiculous that a less generous period of limitation can apply to a claim against the perpetrator of intentional sexual abuse, than to a claim against someone for negligently failing to prevent that abuse .

“We want to see the law changed to allow claims of genuine merit to be pursued through the courts and we are willing to fight as far as we have in trying to achieve that aim.” The law firm is acting for Mrs A on a “no win, no fee” basis and intends to donate any success fee recovered from the case to a local charity that supports victims of serious sexual abuse.

The case also highlights the inadequacy of awards from the Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme. But the scheme has suffered over the years from cuts to its budget. And even the most generous scheme funded by taxpayers in the world would not detract from the apparent disparity in what Mrs A has received and the bounty enjoyed by her attacker, now living in a six-bedroom house on the outskirts of Newcastle.

Should people, though, be able to pursue claims many years after an event just because their target has come into money? In general lawyers say “no”: or people would have the potential of claims hovering over them for life. But simply to grant a discretion to judges to extend the time-bar in certain cases would not open the floodgate to claims, Mr Crosse argues. The burden of persuading a judge would still fall to the claimant; that should act as a check against potential abuse.

He adds: “The law on limitation has to strike a reasonable balance between the interests of claimants and defendants. As it stands, it does not get that balance right in cases of intentional sexual assault.”

The law lords may agree that the law is unjust but that it is for Parliament, not them, to change it. In cases like this, though — one of many proposed reforms from the Law Commission that are stacking up — and with a full Parliamentary timetable, the law lords have a clear chance to create new and fairer law.

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