RAS Al Khaimah Investment Authority v Farhad Azima
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Andrew Lenon |
| Judgment Date | 30 June 2020 |
| Neutral Citation | [2020] EWHC 1686 (Ch) |
| Date | 30 June 2020 |
| Docket Number | Case No. HC-2016-002798 |
| Court | Chancery Division |
[2020] EWHC 1686 (Ch)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
BUSINESS AND PROPERTY COURTS
OF ENGLAND AND WALES
BUSINESS LIST (ChD)
Royal Courts of Justice
Rolls Building, Fetter Lane, London EC4A 1NL
Andrew Lenon Q.C. (sitting as a Deputy Judge of the Chancery Division)
Case No. HC-2016-002798
Hugh Tomlinson Q.C. and Edward Craven (instructed by Stewarts Law LLP) for the Claimant
Tim Lord Q.C. and Hugo Leith (instructed by Burlingtons LLP) for the Defendant
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.
APPROVED ADDENDUM TO JUDGMENT
Introduction
On 22 May 2020 I handed down judgment (“the Judgment”) following the trial in these proceedings, which took place on dates between 22 January and 14 February 2020, and gave directions for an exchange of submissions on costs and interest. On 29 May 2020, before making a final order to give effect to the Judgment, I received a letter from Enyo Law LLP (“Enyo Law”) acting on behalf of Mr Neil Gerrard stating that Mr Gerrard wished to file a corrective witness statement. As noted in the Judgment (paragraph 62), Mr Gerrard is a partner in the firm of Dechert LLP (“Dechert”) who has been retained by RAKIA to work on various matters from 2014 onwards. He was directly involved in certain of the events in issue in the proceedings. He provided two witness statements, was called as a witness by RAKIA at the trial and cross-examined by Counsel for Mr Azima for slightly over one day.
One of the matters about which Mr Gerrard was cross-examined was his dealings with Mr Karam Al Sadeq who has been held prisoner in Ras al Khaimah (“RAK”) since 2014. Those dealings were material to these proceedings: one of RAKIA's claims in the proceedings was that Mr Azima had orchestrated a malicious campaign to damage the reputation, standing and internal stability of the Government of RAK by procuring the publication in the media of false stories that individuals were being unlawfully detained in a dungeon operated by the Ruler of RAK and Dechert and that the Ruler of RAK had improperly abdicated judicial, prosecutorial and governmental functions to unlicensed UK lawyers, who were overseeing the operation of a secret prison in RAK. In the Judgment (paragraph 202) I held that RAKIA failed to establish that the stories intended to be published about human rights violations in RAK were untrue and so this claim failed. A 2014 Amnesty International Report indicated that there were real grounds for concern about detention procedures in RAK and none of RAKIA's witnesses were in a position to refute the findings in that report.
Mr Gerrard is now the second defendant to proceedings commenced by Mr Al Sadeq in the English High Court (“the Al Sadeq Proceedings”). Mr Al Sadeq alleges that Mr Gerrard together with one current partner of Dechert (Caroline Black) and one former partner (David Hughes) violated Mr Al Sadeq's rights by using threats and/or mistreatment and/or unlawful methods to force Mr Al Sadeq to give evidence and/or false evidence in an attempt to build a case, at the behest of the Ruler of RAK, against Dr Khater Massaad, a former senior government official. As noted in paragraphs 13 – 15 of the Judgment, RAKIA alleges that Dr Massaad was guilty of large-scale embezzlement. Whilst the defendants have yet to file a defence in the Al Sadeq Proceedings, Mr Gerrard confirms that they strongly deny all of the claims.
The letter from Enyo Law stated that it had recently become apparent during the course of investigations for the purposes of the Al Sadeq Proceedings that Mr Gerrard's memory regarding the investigation relating to Mr Al Sadeq was “not right” and that Mr Gerrard wished to correct the position by filing a corrective third witness statement.
Following receipt of the letter, I revoked the directions I had made and directed an exchange of submissions concerning the issues raised by the new evidence. Following an exchange of submissions and the filing of Mr Gerrard's third witness statement on 5 June 2020, I notified the parties that I intended to issue an addendum to the Judgment and invited the parties, if so advised, to file any responsive submissions which they did. On 23 June 2020 I received a further memorandum from Mr Azima's Counsel concerning evidence given in yet other proceedings by Mr Hughes, the former Dechert partner and defendant in the Al Sadeq Proceedings. This additional material was of no assistance in resolving the issues raised by Mr Gerrard's third witness statement.
Mr Azima has invited me to re-open the Judgment and to recall Mr Gerrard for further cross-examination. The purpose of this Addendum to the Judgment is to set out the reasons for my decision not to do so.
Mr Gerrard's account of events between the trial and the third witness statement
In his third witness statement, Mr Gerrard says that he did not prepare for trial on the basis that he would be cross-examined in detail in relation to matters regarding his interviews with Mr and Mrs Al Sadeq and had not refreshed his memory beforehand of the interviews he had conducted; during his cross-examination, he believed that he recollected the relevant details but it has recently become apparent that he was mistaken in some aspects of his recollections; as a result, and inadvertently, the answers he gave to some questions were not completely accurate; the reason that this has come to his attention is because he has had to focus upon these issues in the context of the Al Sadeq Proceedings.
Mr Gerrard's account of the sequence of events between the trial and third witness statement is as follows:
8.1 The Claim Form in the Al Sadeq Proceedings was issued on 28 January 2020 (coincidentally, the second day of his cross-examination). The Claim Form included brief details of claim but not the Particulars of Claim. The Claim Form was not served on any of the defendants at that stage, but was published online by www.mynewsdesk.com. In addition to the Claim Form, a copy of a complaint against Mr Gerrard to the Solicitors Regulation Authority was also published online. Mr Gerrard was not aware of the claim or SRA complaint prior to being cross-examined though both were drawn to his attention immediately afterwards as a result of the online publication.
8.2 Enyo Law wrote on Dechert's and Mr Gerrard's behalf to Mr Al Sadeq's lawyers on 19 March 2020 stating that, in light of the working restrictions caused by COVID-19, they were authorised to accept service of pleadings from the Al Sadeq Proceedings by email.
8.3 The Claim Form and the 64-page Particulars of Claim in the Al Sadeq Proceedings were served on Mr Gerrard by email to Enyo Law on 31 March 2020. The Particulars alleged that his evidence under cross-examination in these proceedings had been “perjurious” in three respects, namely where he had stated that:
(a) he had only conducted one interview with Mr Al Sadeq (§62);
(b) he had only interviewed him with the agreement of Mr Al Sadeq and his lawyer (§62); and
(c) he did not interview Mrs Al Sadeq (§104).
8.4 During this time, Mr Gerrard contracted COVID-19 as did the rest of his household. He first developed symptoms and started to become seriously unwell on approximately 19 March 2020. He was advised by his doctors on two occasions that it was thought that he might require treatment in hospital. Whilst that has not been necessary, he suffered severely from the illness for some 16 days and during this time lost a stone and a half in weight. It has taken him some time subsequently to recover from the illness.
8.5 The contemporaneous material relating to the Al Sadeq Proceedings forms part of Dechert's client files and engages questions of privilege. Material was made available to Enyo Law and Mr Gerrard from these client files from 1 May 2020 onwards for the purposes of the Al Sadeq Proceedings.
8.6 Members of the Enyo Law team were first able to discuss details relating to the Al Sadeq Proceedings with Mr Gerrard on 11 May 2020 and with the other individual defendants on 14 and 18 May 2020, respectively.
8.7 In the light of these discussions, and a subsequent review by Enyo Law on 25 May 2020 of the answers he gave under cross-examination in these proceedings, it became apparent to Mr Gerrard on 26 May 2020 during discussions with Enyo Law that he needed to correct some of those answers in order to comply with his professional duties. This realisation precipitated the letter from Enyo Law of 29 May 2020 and the production of the third witness statement.
The corrections
The corrections which Mr Gerrard wishes to make to his evidence on the basis of his third witness statement are as follows.
9.1 Number of meetings/interviews with Mr Al Sadeq Mr Gerrard had said in cross-examination that he interviewed Mr Al Sadeq only once: “I only did one of the interviews myself”. In his corrective witness statement he says that he interviewed Mr Al Sadeq at least four times in September and October 2014 and on at least two further occasions, on 25 August 2015 and 25 April 2016. Mr Gerrard therefore accepts that he interviewed Mr Al Sadeq at least six times. He also accepts that he met with Mr Al Sadeq on further occasions when Mr Al Sadeq was in custody but suggests that these were meetings rather than interviews. Mr Gerrard says that the distinction between meetings and interviews is not always clear-cut but that he understands an interview to be a question-and-answer session designed to elicit...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Ras Al Khaimah Investment Authority v Farhad Azima
...OF ENGLAND AND WALES Mr Andrew Lenon QC (sitting as a Deputy Judge of the High Court) Business List (ChD), [2020] EWHC 1327 (Ch) and [2020] EWHC 1686 (Ch) Royal Courts of Justice Strand, London, WC2A 2LL Covid-19 Protocol: This judgment was handed down remotely by circulation to the parties......
-
Upper Tribunal (Immigration and asylum chamber), 2021-03-29, HU/10552/2019
...statement was filed with the Tribunal. I am mindful of the High Court confirmation in Ras Al Khaimah Investment Authority v Azima [2020] EWHC 1686 (Ch), at [19], that a solicitor in giving evidence to a court, or tribunal, is under a duty to be not only completely honest but also scrupulous......
-
Karam Salah Al Din Awni Al Sadeq v Dechert LLP
...from the parties. On 30 June 2020 he issued an Addendum to his original judgment (the neutral citation for the Addendum is [2020] EWHC 1686 (Ch)) in which he set out his reasons for not acceding to Mr Azima's request to re-open his original judgment and to recall Mr Gerrard for further cro......