A Hovis baker is suing his old bosses for £280,000 because a fall at work left him ‘brain-damaged and disabled’, he claims. 

Yacob Adan, 45, was pulling a trolley of baking tins down a narrow corridor when he tripped over a bolt in the floor in March 2014. He broke his collarbone and claims he was unconscious for three minutes. 

Mr Adan says he has been left with ‘mild’ brain damage and persistent pain in his back and arm which has caused depression. 

The dad wants Premier Foods Plc, the parent company which used to own Hovis, to pay him £280,000 for his suffering. 

He said the compensation would cover the £40,000 he claims he has had to spend on care for his children because his ‘disability’ has meant he cannot look after them himself.

All the while, he has also allegedly been unable to work in the seven years since the accident in the Kent bakery.

Although Premier Foods Plc agrees that Mr Adan was hurt during his fall, the company believes Ms Adan is ‘exaggerating’ his symptoms in a ‘fraudulent’ effort to score extra cash. 

The company’s barrister, Simon McCann, told Central London County Court: ‘The reason the level of symptoms complained of has no medical explanation is because there could not be one.

‘It is disputed that the claimant has been unable to work since the accident. All of the medical evidence and the surveillance evidence points to the fact that the claimant is fit for work.

‘If he is not working – as he may not be – he is doing it out of choice.’

Mr McCann showed the court a video he said was proof that Mr Adan used his right arm, which he says is still hurt, to carry a bag and to balance himself on a bus. 

The lawyer also hoped the video would show that Mr Adan was the ‘primary carer’ for his children and did not spend the £40,000 he claims went to someone else to look after his kids.

Mr McCann went on to accuse Mr Adan of telling ‘lies time and time again’ and denied that Mr Adan was ever unconscious after the fall.

But the baker protested and told the judge, through a Somali interpreter, that he remembers coming back into consciousness while he was still on the floor, with people all around him.

His barrister, Robert Parkin, argued that the video actually proved Mr Adan’s injuries were as bad as he says.

He said the footage showed Mr Adan using his left hand more, despite being right-handed, and moving ‘relatively sluggishly’ at a time where he did not know he was being watched. 

Mr Parkin also believes that the medical evidence does not show any exaggeration. 

He told the court several psychiatrists had agreed Mr Adan suffered from depression which could have been contributed to by ‘persistent pain’. 

The lawyer said: ‘What is clear is that the claimant suffered a fractured right clavicle and a mild brain injury which would have had relatively short term physical consequences, probably with recovery after around one year.

‘However he may, as a result, have been more vulnerable to pain symptoms and a depressive episode as a result.’ 

The hearing continues. 

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