Dmitrii Vladimirovich Sheianov v Sarner International Ltd
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Mr Justice Griffiths |
| Judgment Date | 15 May 2020 |
| Neutral Citation | [2020] EWHC 1214 (QB) |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division |
| Docket Number | Case No: QB-2019-003929 |
| Date | 15 May 2020 |
[2020] EWHC 1214 (QB)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL
Mr Justice Griffiths
Case No: QB-2019-003929
Alexander Halban (instructed by Bates, Wells & Braithwaite London LLP) for the Claimants
Yash Kulkarni QC (instructed by Keystone Law Ltd) for the Defendant
Hearing date: 1 May 2020
Approved Judgment
I direct that pursuant to CPR PD 39A para 6.1 no official shorthand note shall be taken of this Judgment and that copies of this version as handed down may be treated as authentic.
The Defendant, for a contract price of just under £1.75 million, agreed to design, create and supply materials for an exhibition including 27 vintage motorcycles lent to it for that purpose. Its most recent invoice of £524,628.90 has not been paid. It believes that the company owing the money under the contract has no assets. But it still has the motorcycles. Can it keep them until it is paid? The answer to this question depends, primarily, on whether the Defendant is entitled to exercise the common law right known as a particular lien.
The parties
The Defendant is Sarner International Limited. It is described in the evidence as an international creative design and audio-visual system integration company whose clients include corporate venues, theme parks, visitor attractions, museums, exhibitions, conferences, themed restaurants and retail outlets. I will refer to it as “the Defendant”.
The First Claimant is Mr Dmitrii Vladimirovich Sheianov. He claims to own 19 of the vintage motorcycles in question, although the Defendant does not accept that. I will refer to him as the First Claimant.
The First Claimant has a brother called Vyacheslav Sheianov (who I will refer to as “VS”). VS owns the Second Claimant, which is a Limited Liability Company called “Motorworld by Vyacheslav Sheyanov” or “Motomir Vyacheslava Sheianova, LLC”, both names being used in the title of the action. I will refer to it as the Second Claimant. The Second Claimant says it owns 8 of the vintage motorcycles in question, although the Defendant does not accept that either.
Part of the background against which the Defendant challenges the First and Second Claimants' right to possession (which is a pre-requisite of their claim for delivery up, whether or not the Defendant is entitled to exercise a particular lien) is that the Defendant's contract was not with either of the First or Second Claimants.
The Defendant's contract was with a company which is not party to these proceedings, incorporated in the British Virgin Islands, called “Motomir Viacheslava Sheianova Ltd” in the contract itself. I will refer to it as “BVI Co”. BVI Co was (as its full name suggests) owned by VS, who was (as I have mentioned) the owner of the Second Claimant and brother of the First Claimant.
Procedural history
Since the Defendant refuses to give back the motorcycles until it has been paid in full by BVI Co, the First and Second Claimants have issued and served a Claim Form and Particulars of Claim on the Defendant, to which the Defendant have responded with a Defence and Counterclaim. A Reply and Defence to Counterclaim has also been served.
The Claimants have drawn out the Defendant further on its case with a Request for Further Information, to which the Defendant responded on 31 December 2019.
The Claimants have now issued an Application Notice seeking:
“Summary judgment against the Defendant on the Claimants' claim and on the Defendant's counterclaim, pursuant to CPR r. 24.2; and/or an order striking out the Defence and Counterclaim and entering judgment for the Claimant, pursuant to CPR r.3.4(1)(a); and (in either case) an order for delivery up by the Defendant to the Claimants (or their nominated agent) of the motorcycles which are the subject of the claim, for the reasons set out in the attached witness statement.”
The evidence in support of this application is a witness statement from the Claimants' solicitor. The application is opposed by a witness statement from the Defendant's managing director, Mr Ross Magri. There is no other evidence, and no party has asked for time to file further evidence.
This is the application which I have to decide. Although there is a strike-out application in the alternative, the case is put primarily on the basis that the Claimants are entitled to summary judgment.
The issues
The test for obtaining summary judgment under CPR is (by CPR r 24.2) that the Defendant “has no real prospect of successfully defending the claim or issue” and “there is no other compelling reason why the case or issue would be disposed of at a trial.” The Defendant argues that it has a real prospect of successfully defending the claim and, indeed, that the matter is so clear cut in its favour that the claim should be dismissed and the trial should proceed on the Defendant's Counterclaim only.
What amounts to a “real prospect” for these purposes has been settled over the course of discussion in many well-known cases, which are (as recognised by the Court of Appeal in AC Ward & Son v Catlin (Five) Ltd [2009] EWCA Civ 1098 at [24]) conveniently reviewed and summarised by Lewison J in Easyair Ltd v Opal Telecom Ltd [2009] EWHC 339 (Ch) at [15] as follows:-
“i) The court must consider whether the claimant has a “realistic” as opposed to a “fanciful” prospect of success: Swain v Hillman [2001] 1 All ER 91;
ii) A “realistic” claim is one that carries some degree of conviction. This means a claim that is more than merely arguable: ED & F Man Liquid Products v Patel [2003] EWCA Civ 472 at [8];
iii) In reaching its conclusion the court must not conduct a “mini-trial”: Swain v Hillman;
iv) This does not mean that the court must take at face value and without analysis everything that a claimant says in his statements before the court. In some cases it may be clear that there is no real substance in factual assertions made, particularly if contradicted by contemporaneous documents: ED & F Man Liquid Products v Patel at [10];
v) However, in reaching its conclusion the court must take into account not only the evidence actually placed before it on the application for summary judgment, but also the evidence that can reasonably be expected to be available at trial: Royal Brompton Hospital NHS Trust v Hammond (No 5) [2001] EWCA Civ 550;
vi) Although a case may turn out at trial not to be really complicated, it does not follow that it should be decided without the fuller investigation into the facts at trial than is possible or permissible on summary judgment. Thus the court should hesitate about making a final decision without a trial, even where there is no obvious conflict of fact at the time of the application, where reasonable grounds exist for believing that a fuller investigation into the facts of the case would add to or alter the evidence available to a trial judge and so affect the outcome of the case: Doncaster Pharmaceuticals Group Ltd v Bolton Pharmaceutical Co 100 Ltd [2007] FSR 63;
vii) On the other hand it is not uncommon for an application under Part 24 to give rise to a short point of law or construction and, if the court is satisfied that it has before it all the evidence necessary for the proper determination of the question and that the parties have had an adequate opportunity to address it in argument, it should grasp the nettle and decide it. The reason is quite simple: if the respondent's case is bad in law, he will in truth have no real prospect of succeeding on his claim or successfully defending the claim against him, as the case may be. Similarly, if the applicant's case is bad in law, the sooner that is determined, the better. If it is possible to show by evidence that although material in the form of documents or oral evidence that would put the documents in another light is not currently before the court, such material is likely to exist and can be expected to be available at trial, it would be wrong to give summary judgment because there would be a real, as opposed to a fanciful, prospect of success. However, it is not enough simply to argue that the case should be allowed to go to trial because something may turn up which would have a bearing on the question of construction: ICI Chemicals & Polymers Ltd v TTE Training Ltd [2007] EWCA Civ 725.”
Before me, the Defendant has argued two issues which, it says, provide it with at least a real prospect of success at trial in resisting the Claimants' claim for delivery up of the motorcycles.
i) It has challenged, first, the Claimants' right to possession, pointing out that all 27 of the motorcycles (that is, both those claimed by the First Claimant and those claimed by the Second Claimant) were delivered pursuant to the Defendant's contract with BVI Co and not by the First or Second Claimants.
ii) It has argued, secondly, and in any event, that it is entitled to retain possession of the motorcycles against anyone, including a person with good title, because it is exercising a particular lien over them until it has been paid.
Uncontroversial background facts
The following facts appear from the evidence and the documents and do not appear to be controversial.
Initial contact and earlier contractual arrangements
The Defendant's original contact was with VS, in April 2017.
Following this, the Second Claimant (the company belonging to VS) and the Defendant entered into a contract prior to the one under which the Defendant now claims its particular lien. This contract was for the Defendant to work up an initial proposal and feasibility study, and I...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Axa Insurance DAC and Bells of Crossgar Accident Repair Centre Limited
...as distinct from mere maintenance, of a chattel bailed to him for that purpose.”1 [17] Recently, in Sheianov v Sarner International [2020] EWHC 1214 (QB), Griffiths J conducted a review of many of the older authorities and from these he distilled the following principles: “(i) A particular ......