Hotel Portfolio II UK Ltd & anr v Ruhan & ors [2024] WTLR 145

Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Spring 2024 #194

This was an appeal against a decision of Foxton J ordering the second defendant to pay £102m in compensation for dishonest assistance along with nearly £60m in interest.

The first defendant had been a director of the first claimant. In breach of fiduciary duty, the first defendant had caused the first claimant to sell company assets related to several London hotels to a corporate purchaser in which the first defendant had an undisclosed interest. The sale was at an objectively reasonable market price. The purchaser later sold the hotels for a large profit (partly due to having dev...

Caldicott & ors v Richards & anor [2020] WTLR 823

Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Autumn 2020 #180

Mr Caldicott is the son of the late Mrs Yvonne Caldicott, who died in November 2012. He, his wife and his adult son brought a claim against his sister, Mrs Pearson, and her co-executor Mrs Walker, as trustees of a discretionary will trust declared by their mother’s will. The beneficiaries of the trust were a closed class composed of the claimants and Mrs Pearson. Mrs Pearson and her co-trustee are private client solicitors and are now both partners in a firm specialising in that field.

Under the terms of the will Mrs Pearson was given a 50% interest in a family company, Wyvern Sec...

High Commissioner for Pakistan in the United Kingdom v Prince Mukkaram Jah, His Exalted Highness the 8th Nizam of Hyderabad [2016] EWHC 1465 (Ch)

Wills & Trusts Law Reports | December 2016 #165

The underlying claim concerned monies deposited in a new bank account with the National Westminster Bank (the bank) in the name of Mr Rahimtoola, the High Commissioner for Pakistan in London between 16 and 20 September 1948 (the Fund). The monies deposited had belonged to the state of Hyderabad/the 7th Nizam (Hyderabad’s absolute monarch at the time). The state of Hyderabad had been annexed to India between 13 and 18 September 2016. The underlying claim had been brought by Pakistan against the bank. A number of other defendants claiming an interest in the fund had been joined. Consequent...

Barnsley & ors v Noble [2016] EWCA Civ 799

Wills & Trusts Law Reports | November 2016 #164

Michael and Philip Noble were brothers who built up a substantial property empire known as the Noble Organisation. It had a complex ownership and management structure involving a number of companies and partnerships and certain trusts for the benefit of their respective families. Michael died in 2006. The executors were Philip, his widow Gillian, and John Barnsley (an accountant associated with PricewaterhouseCoopers). There was a demerger of the business side and property side of the Noble Organisation with Philip taking the business assets and Gill taking the property assets. This was ...

Trustees: Self-dealing – rigours and risks

Brudenell-Bruce offers salutary lessons about the self-dealing rule, as Simon Atkinson explains ‘Brudenell-Bruce provides a restatement of the law relating to estoppel by deed and applies principles of construction to deeds and consent orders.’ For chancery practitioners Brudenell-Bruce (Earl of Cardigan) v Moore and Cotton [2012] provides valuable guidance in a number of areas. The …
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Cardigan v Moore & anr [2012] EWHC 1024 (Ch)

Wills & Trusts Law Reports | July/August 2012 #121

At the end of the 1940s, the Savernake Estate, which was the subject of these proceedings, was held by a company owned by the 7th and 8th Marquesses of Ailesbury. Between 1949 and 1951 the company was replaced by a partnership. There was a conveyance executed in 1951 by which the estate was conveyed to the Marquesses on trust for sale as part of their partnership. The partnership property also included the family collection of paintings and other chattels. By 1963, there was an agreement that the partnership would be carried on by the 8th Marquess, who had a 51% share, and the trustees f...