Southwell v Blackburn [2014] EWCA Civ 1347
January/February 2015 #146In 2002, the appellant and the respondent set up home together in a house in Droitwich. They remained unmarried. The property was purchased in the appellant’s sole name with his money alone, and he took on sole responsibility for the mortgage. On the breakdown of their relationship, the respondent claimed that the appellant held the property was held by him on constructive trust for both parties in equal shares. That claim failed before His Honour Judge Pearce-Higgins QC, but her alternative proprietary estoppel claim succeeded. The respondent was awarded £28,500 in satisfaction of the e...
Curati v Perdoni & anr [2012] EWCA Civ 1381
January/February 2013 #126Pierluigi Curati (Mr Curati) had a domicile of origin in Italy. He moved with his wife (Mrs Curati), a British national, to England in 1955. Mr and Mrs Curati ran a family restaurant (inherited from Mrs Curati’s parents) until 1970, when they sold the restaurant and invested the proceeds in real property which added to the property portfolio which they had already started to build up in England. They also held real property in Italy which they rented to third parties. On 18 December 1980, Mr and Mrs Curati made formal mirror wills in England, drawn in English which were limited t...
Gallarotti v Sebastianelli [2012] EWCA Civ 865
November 2012 #124Mr Gallarotti (G) and Mr Sebastianelli (S) had been friends since 1988. They moved to London to make their careers and habitually rented flats together, both contributing towards the outgoings. In 1997 they took the step of buying a flat (the flat) together, although it was transferred into S’s sole name. The total cost was £188,287.44. S contributed £86,500 and G contributed £26,896.20. The remainder was met by a mortgage taken out by S and against which G agreed to postpone any interest he might have.
No written agreement existed to establish an express declaration of trus...
Independent Trustee Services Ltd v GP Noble Trustees Ltd & ors [2012] EWCA Civ 195
September 2012 #122Anthony Morris (Mr Morris) orchestrated a series of frauds between August 2007 and April 2008 by which £52m was misappropriated from various occupational pension schemes by their trustees, GP Noble Trustees Ltd and BDC Trustees Ltd. The appellant was Independent Trustee Services Ltd (ITS), which had been appointed as trustee of the 1653 pension schemes by the Pensions Regulator in July 2008. Mr Morris was found liable in dishonest assistance for £52m and in knowing receipt for £4.89m by Peter Smith J in July 2010 ([2010] EWHC 1653 (Ch)) (the chancery action).
Mr Morris had married...
Central Bank of Nigeria v Williams [2012] EWCA Civ 415
June 2012 #120In 1986, Dr Williams (D) participated in a transaction under which, he alleges, he was defrauded of $6,520,190. He commenced proceedings on 10 March 2010 against Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) alone, asserting that: an English solicitor, Reuben Gale (R), held that sum of money in his client account in trust for D on terms that he would only release it if and when certain funds had been paid in Nigeria; in May 1986 R fraudulently paid away $6,020,190 of the sum held by him for D to the account of CBN with Midland Bank in England; CBN was party to the fraud; and R retained the balance of $5...