On 24 February 2021 the Court of Appeal handed down judgment in Dale v Banga and others [2021] EWCA Civ 240. The opening paragraph of the (main) judgment of Lady Justice Asplin makes it clear what the issue in the appeal was:
“This appeal raises the question of what the appeal court should do when fresh evidence is adduced after a trial which allegedly shows that the judgment below was obtained by fraud, the conduct relied upon being that of a witness and of a party to the action which took place after the events in issue, and is unrelated to the issues which were before the court. In particular, it raises the following questions: whether the fresh evidence (permission to rely upon it having already been granted) is capable of establishing that the Respondents misled the judge at trial by asserting that a letter of revocation in relation to a will had been duly attested; if so, whether the question of whether the judge was misled (the fraud issue) should be referred to the lower court to be determined or should be the subject of a separate action; and, if it is determined that the lower court was misled by fraud, whether a previous will should be admitted to probate on the basis of the original judge’s obiter dicta.”
This is an issue which this blog has previously dealt with.
The “fresh evidence” concerned the discovery that one of the two attesting witnesses to the letter had been sent to prison for fraud offences, and Mr Banga himself had been indicted with attempting to pervert the course of justice (though no evidence was offered at trial and he was acquitted):
“7…It is alleged, nevertheless, that it is incontrovertible that Mr Banga had sought to pervert the course of justice by the production of false invoices.
8. Mr Brennan, on behalf of Mrs Dale, submits that if the fresh evidence had been available to be adduced at trial it would have entirely changed the way in which the judge approached the question of the proper attestation of the Letter and his conclusion in that regard. It is said that the fresh evidence: undermines Mr Arif’s credibility as a witness of fact (as to the attestation of the Letter); supports the conclusion that Mr Arif and Mr Banga are sufficiently dishonest to have attempted to deceive the court about the circumstances in which the Letter was signed by the attesting witnesses and even that it was a forgery and was produced on another occasion; made Mr Arif the obvious person to have been chosen to assist in attempting to deceive the court; and gave Mr Arif an obvious motive to assist Mr Banga and his family.”
Coming back to Asplin LJ’s judgment, she explained what would be necessary to allow for a set aside of the final judgment:
- It is not sufficient that the evidence given below can now be proved to have been mistaken.
- It is not sufficient that a witness committed perjury.
- “It is necessary that the judgment was obtained by fraud and that the fraud was that of a party to the action or was at least suborned by or knowingly relied upon by that party” (27).
- There are two options then available – a new action to set aside the judgment (as preferred by the Court of Appeal – Salekipour v Parmer [2018] QB 833) or an appeal against the original order as in the present case, alleging that the judgment upon which it is based was obtained by fraud (39-41).
As for the test on appeal:
“42…It seems to me that it is necessary to decide whether the new evidence is capable of showing that the judge was deliberately misled by the Respondents and that the judgment may have been obtained by fraud. It must be sufficient to justify pleading a case of fraud. It must be capable of showing that there was conscious and deliberate dishonesty which was causative of the judgment being obtained in the terms it was. The conscious and deliberate dishonesty must be that of a party to the action, or was at least suborned by or knowingly relied upon by a party.
43. Secondly, if that threshold test is satisfied, the court must determine whether on the facts and in the circumstances of the particular case, it is appropriate that the fraud issue should be remitted or otherwise dealt with within the same proceedings. There is no question but that the appeal court has power to “refer any claim or issue for determination by the lower court”: CPR 52.20(2)(b). The question is whether the discretion to do so should be exercised. It is not possible to list the matters which will be relevant to the exercise of that discretion because they inevitably depend on the circumstances.”
Ultimately, the court declined to remit the issue of fraud to the lower court and dismissed the appeal:
“45. Unlike in Noble v Owens, the new evidence is of allegedly similar fact and bad character. It does not go directly to the central matters of fact before the judge. It requires inferences to be drawn based upon the alleged lack of credibility of the witnesses who gave evidence before him and their alleged propensities. It is tangential. Furthermore, all of the conduct from which it is said that the inferences should be drawn post-dates the alleged attestation of the Letter.”
Cases cited in judgment:
Odyssey Re (London) Ltd & Ors v OIC Run Off Limited & Ors [2000] EWCA Civ 71
Cinpres Gas Injection Ltd v Melea Ltd [2008] EWCA Civ 9
Takhar v Gracefield Developments Ltd & Ors [2020] AC 450
Royal Bank of Scotland plc v Highland Financial Partners lp [2013] 1 CLC 596
Noble v Owens [2010] EWCA Civ 224, [2010] 1 WLR 2491
Salekipour v Parmar [2017] EWCA Civ 2141, [2018] QB 833