Don King Productions Inc. v Warren
Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
Judgment Date | 27 March 1998 |
Date | 27 March 1998 |
Court | Chancery Division |
Chancery Division
Before Mr Justice Lightman
Equity - contracts to be assigned to partnership - incapable of performance at law - equity will give effect to agreement
A partnership agreement providing that all contracts to which each partner was party be assigned to the partnership, which was incapable of performance at law because the contracts in question, being contracts for personal services and containing provisions expressly forbidding assignment, were non-assignable, could nevertheless be given effect in equity as a declaration of trust of those contracts, provided that there was no express provision in the contracts also prohibiting such declaration of trust.
The partner who was party to such a contract accordingly held the benefit of that contract as trustee for the benefit of the partnership absolutely, and both the contract and the fruits of the contract formed part of the partnership assets.
Mr Justice Lightman so held in a reserved judgment in the Chancery Division, in determining a number of preliminary issues relating to an action between the plaintiff, Don King Productions Inc and the defendants, Mr Frank Warren, Mr Christopher Roberts, Centurion Promotions Ltd, Sports Network USA Inc and Time Warner Entertainment Company LP, arising out of successive partnership agreements entered into by, inter alia, Mr King and Mr Warren, which, inter alia, purported to provide for the assignment to the partnership by Mr Warren and his company Sports Network Ltd the full benefit and burden of all existing boxing promotion, management and associated agreements to which he was a party.
The preliminary issues included the question of the effect of a purported assignment of, or agreement to assign, for valuable consideration, a non-assignable chose in action.
Mr Michael Briggs QC, Mr Nicholas Le Poidevin and Mr Douglas Close for the plaintiff; Mr Jonathan Sumption, QC, Mr Charles Hollander, Mr Antony Zacaroli and Mr Andrew Thomas for the first, second, third and fourth defendants; Mr Kenneth MacLean for the fifth defendant.
MR JUSTICE LIGHTMAN said that as a matter of general principle, it was quite clear that a trust might exist of a contract, and that might extend, not merely to the benefit of the rights conferred, but also the benefit of being a contracting party.
The question arose whether a purported assignment for valuable consideration, ineffective as an...
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