Latest Cases

Set-off – Right of set-off. The Court of Appeal, Civil Division, in dismissing the appellant's appeal against the grant of summary judgment on the defendants' counterclaim, held that it would not be inequitable for the defendants to rely on set-off in respect of a rebate and they were not estopped from doing so. Further, they had produced debit notes, despite the fact that the judge had not had physical copies. 

Extradition – Extradition order. The Administrative Court allowed the appellant's appeal against orders for his extradition to Lithuania to face trial for dishonestly obtaining property by deception. There had been a significant element of culpable delay, such that extradition was disproportionate to the rights of the appellant and his family, under art 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. 

Costs – Judicial review. The Court of Appeal, Civil Division, dismissed a claimant's appeal which raised the issue of how costs should be determined in the Administrative Court when the parties had settled their differences in an agreed order which recorded that the liability for costs should be determined by a single judge on the papers. The judge had been fully entitled to the view that the claimant had not obtained all the relief he had sought and it had not been shown that her conclusion, that there should be no order for costs, had fallen outside the range of decisions that had been open to her, or that it had been founded on any error of law or principle. 

Indemnity – Construction of indemnity clause. The Court of Appeal, Civil Division, held that the obtaining and receiving of advice after a mistake had been made, even if the mistake could be easily rectified, could not mean that an obligation to correct one's mistake or negligence continued to accrue and give a fresh cause of action every day after the mistake had been made. 

Town and country planning – Development. The Queen's Bench Division refused the claimant local planning authority the grant of an injunction under s 187B of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, as in all the circumstances of the case, the grant of injunctive relief under any of the headings put forward by the claimant was not proportionate. 

Mortgage – Sale. The Court of Appeal, Civil Division, held that, where a mortgagee sold the mortgaged property, the mortgagee's duty to act in good faith and for proper purposes, and to take reasonable care to obtain a proper price, arose in equity and was owed only to those with a recognised interest in the equity of redemption of the mortgaged property. A mortgagee of seven aircraft, in carrying out a sale of six of the aircraft, owed no such duty to the ultimate recipient of the balance of the proceeds of sale of three other aircraft the equity of which had been cross-collateralised against the debt in respect of the seven mortgaged aircraft, where the ultimate recipient had no recognised interest in the equity of redemption in the seven aircraft. 

Employment – Wrongful dismissal. The Queen's Bench Division held that as the claimant had, on the facts, committed repeated breaches of his contract of employment in disclosing confidential information and therefore, the defendant football club employer had been entitled to dismiss him for gross misconduct. 

Criminal evidence – Disclosure. The Court of Appeal, Criminal Division, in a case likely to encompass allegations of very substantial fraud, lifted the statutory reporting restrictions, in part, to enable publication of extracts of the judgment, in order to give guidance on the proper approach to disclosure and abuse of process. In particular, it considered how the prosecution was to comply with its initial disclosure obligation, under s 3 of the Criminal Procedure and Investigations Act 1996, if it had not read, and could not be expected to read, all the material it had seized. 

Solemn procedure – Sexual assault – Sheriff's charge – Concert. High Court of Justiciary: Refusing an appeal by an appellant who was 16 at the time and was convicted of a sexual assault on a young child by penetration following an incident in a dormitory at a Sea Cadets training camp in which another boy inserted his finger into the 12-year-old complainer's anus, the court rejected the contention that the sheriff had misdirected the jury when answering a question from them by focusing on causation rather than concert. 

Prisoner – Detention for public protection – Rehabilitation. Court of Session: In judicial review proceedings by a prisoner, the punishment part of whose sentence of life imprisonment expired in March 2005 and who complained he had not been given a reasonable opportunity to progress through the prison estate and demonstrate his safety for release, alleging failings by the Scottish Ministers (the second respondents to the petition) and a local authority (the first respondents), the court refused the petition as against the local authority, holding that the case against them was irrelevant as they did not owe any relevant duty to the petitioner under art 5 of European Convention on Human Rights.