A BUILDER who said a surgeon’s error left him unable to hold a saucepan filmed himself hauling a 20kg kettlebell.
Sean Murphy’s £580,000 damages claim over a bicep op fell apart after a tip-off about him in a gym and playing rugby.
Sean Murphy said a surgeon’s error left him unable to hold a saucepan but filmed himself hauling a 20kg kettlebell[/caption]
Mr Murphy, 38, of Ross, Heref, faces a £100,000-plus High Court bill for alleged contempt.
A full hearing is due later.
Mr Murphy had claimed he couldn’t hold a saucepan or carry clothes, and that “the most he could lift was an empty kettle”.
The NHS admitted that Mr Murphy was entitled to some damages, but said the £580,000 claim was vastly inflated by “gross exaggeration” of his ongoing symptoms.
Lawyers pointed to evidence that suggested Mr Murphy had been back playing rugby within months of his surgery and was again training in the gym.
Photos and videos posted online showed him lifting “very heavy weights” – including bench-pressing 150 kilos – in the gym and his garden, engaging in boxing training, and back on the rugby pitch for Ross-on-Wye’s second team.
Local media reports even mentioned him in the lineup, with one suggesting that he and the rest of the team’s front row “bullied their opposition numbers for the entire game.”
Following a trial at the High Court last October, Judge James Healy-Pratt dismissed Mr Murphy’s claim, which he branded “fundamentally dishonest” after viewing the online evidence.
