Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Autumn 2022 #188The claimants were the only beneficiaries of the estate of the deceased, who died in May 2016. The defendant executor in December 2016 obtained probate of the deceased’s will, which did not authorise remuneration of executors or trustees. Upon completion of the administration, the defendant sought to impose a charge of £27,300 for her time in administering the estate.
The claimants brought proceedings under CPR 64 seeking directions as to whether the defendant was entitled to remuneration. In her evidence in response, the defendant asserted an oral agreement with the clai...
Wills & Trusts Law Reports | May 2015 #149This decision concerned the construction of a trust deed dated 28 November 1944 (the deed) made between Eric Max Warburg on behalf of the Warburg family, Viscount Lee of Fareham on behalf of the Warburg Society, and the University of London (UOL). There arose questions about the scope of the deed, the ownership of property, the status of funding and the propriety of the administration by UOL under the deed. UOL brought a construction summons to determine these questions at the behest of HM Attorney General (the second defendant). The first defendant was Professor John Prag, of the Univer...
Wills & Trusts Law Reports | November 2014 #144Mr Mikhaylyuk (M), a manager for the first respondent, NOUK, with responsibility for negotiating the charters of vessels owned by companies within the Novoship group, the remaining respondents, owed fiduciary duties to all the respondents. M had arranged a series of schemes by which he defrauded his principals and enriched himself and others by the payment of bribes given to him by those who chartered his principals’ vessels. These schemes included one concerning vessels chartered to companies owned and controlled by Mr Ruperti (R) which R then sub-chartered at substantially higher rates...
Mark Pawlowski looks at a landmark ruling on how an agent who has taken advantage of a bribe or received a secret commission in breach of their fiduciary duties holds the amount received ‘So, what has been the subject of judicial and academic controversy for over two centuries has now, at last, been authoritatively put …
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Wills & Trusts Law Reports | January/February 2014 #136In April 2003 qualified dentist Anushika Sharma acquired her first dental practice. In January 2007 she acquired a second practice and in July 2007 she was provided with an opportunity to purchase a third. This opportunity prompted a family meeting to discuss Anushika’s expanding empire. Jagesh Sharma (Sunny), Keshbala Sharma and Rajesh Sharma (Anushika’s then husband, mother-in-law and brother-in-law respectively) and Anushika were in attendance. During this meeting it was determined that a company (ADC Ltd) would be set up to purchase the third practice rather than Anushika doing this ...
Wills & Trusts Law Reports | May 2013 #129The claimants (Investor Group) appealed from the decision of Simon J ([2011] EWHC 2308 (Ch)) that the Investor Group was entitled to a personal, but not a proprietary, remedy against Cedar Capital Partners LLC (Cedar). There was no appeal from Simon J’s decision that Cedar was liable to account in equity to the Investor Group.
Monte Carlo Grand Hotel in Monaco was owned by Monte Carlo Hotel SAM, a Monegasque company. The company’s share capital was owned by Monte Carlo Grand Hotel Ltd, a BVI company. In September 2004, the BVI company was interested in selling the hotel, either by...
Mark Pawlowski and James Brown consider a recent ruling on proprietary relief for a secret commission acquired by an agent for securing the purchase of a property The difficulty confronting future courts will be to identify which situations fall within the opportunity category identified in Sinclair and which fall outside it. It is trite law …
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In the first of two articles, Sukhninder Panesar discusses different approaches to equitable tracing in light of the Court of Appeal decision in Sinclair ‘Until the decision of the Privy Council in AG for Hong Kong v Reid [1994], English law had argued that the right to assert equitable ownership over unauthorised gains in the …
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