Re HM (A Vulnerable Adult: Abduction)

Hearing date: 30 April 2010

Lord Justice Munby:

1. On 28 October 2009 I handed down a judgment explaining the order I had made on 6 September 2009 following a four-day hearing before me in August 2009: Re HM (Adult), PM v KH and anor[2009] EWHC 2685 (Fam). On 30 April 2010 I handed down a judgment which brought the history of events down to that date: Re HM (Adult), PM v KH and anor (No 2)[2010] EWHC 870(Fam).

2. I take those judgments as read and do not propose to set out the background. It suffices to record that the first of those judgments set out my reasons for declaring that it was in HM's best interests to reside and be cared for at Y and described how, despite that order, her father, PM, removed her to Israel. The second judgment set out, amongst other things, the steps that had had to be taken both in this country and in Israel before HM was returned to this county on 8 April 2010 in the care of her mother, KH, pursuant to orders made by the Family Court, District Court and Supreme Court of Israel.

3. My purpose in this judgment is to explain the various orders I made at a further hearing before me on 30 April 2010 which PM, although he had been given notice, chose not to attend.

4. For that hearing the Official Solicitor, as HM's litigation friend, filed a position statement explaining that he agreed with the States of Guernsey, as indeed KH did, that HM should move to Y in accordance with the transition plan proposed by the States of Guernsey. PM set out his position in two emails. In the first, dated 29 April 2010, he made a catalogue of complaints about just about everybody; his essential stance was that HM should not be placed at Y until what he called “the risk of grave danger” had been “properly and independently assessed.” In the second, dated 30 April 2010, he complained that the Official Solicitor's solicitors had not supplied him with certain documents relating to the proceedings.

5. Following the hearing on 30 April 2010 I made a further nine orders:

i) One order provided for HM's welfare needs. I approved the transition plan for HM to take up residence at Y which, as I am satisfied, not least in the light of all the professional evidence I have read and heard, remains in HM's best interests. The “danger” to which PM refers exists only in his mind and reflects nothing more than his inability to accept anything which does not accord with his own entrenched views. I also imposed a raft of injunctions against PM which I am satisfied are imperatively needed, at least for the immediate future, to safeguard HM's welfare, and her placement at Y, and to control PM's seemingly unrestrained and potentially destructive behaviour. Finally, the order directed a further hearing before me in July 2010 for a review and determination of the question of costs.

ii) Another order, which I was invited to make by the Official Solicitor, KH and the States of Guernsey, provided for the release to PM in two stages (initially the sum of £20,000 and thereafter the balance) of the funds previously held by DP and blocked by the order I had made in December 2009. The unblocking of those monies was foreshadowed in paragraph [52] of my previous judgment. Given that the other parties all consented to my making the order, and consistently with what I had said in my previous judgment, it was plainly appropriate to unblock these funds.

iii) Another order continued until 14 September 2010 the order I had made on 14 April 2010 blocking the funds held by X (see paragraph [51] of my previous judgment). My reason for doing so remained as before, namely that the evidence satisfied me that there is a real risk that PM would seek to place his assets beyond the jurisdiction of the court, thereby prejudicing the claims for costs which both the Official Solicitor and, now, the States of Guernsey propose to make against him (see further below).

iv) Five orders discharged various orders I had made on 12 November 2009 relating to the three individuals who had appeared and given oral evidence at the hearing on that date and to the two further friends or associates of PM who are referred to in paragraph [24(iii)] of my previous judgment. My reason for making these orders is as set out in paragraphs [50], [53]-[54] of that judgment.

v) The final order, in addition to giving various general directions, dealt with five matters:

a) It recited the disclosure already made to PM by the Official Solicitor's solicitors and provided that if PM sought to assert that any further documents ought to be disclosed he should apply on notice.

b) It gave directions in relation to the committal application which the Official Solicitor informed me he proposed to make against PM. Included amongst them was a direction that the committal application was not to be listed before any of the six judges of the Family Division who have previously dealt with this litigation.

c) It gave directions in relation to the costs applications being made against PM both by the Official Solicitor and by the States of Guernsey.

d) It directed the Official Solicitor's solicitors to provide an account (and supporting documentation) in respect of the funds previously held by DP.

e) Finally, it gave directions in relation to any application by PM in respect of costs or in respect of the sums expended from the funds previously held by DP.

6. The injunctions contained in the order referred to in sub-paragraph (i) above are set out in the Annexe to this judgment. They are in large part self-explanatory and require little further justification given all the matters set out in my two previous judgments. I recognise that they are swingeing in their effect. I regret the necessity which compels me to make them. But PM has now on two occasions (see paragraphs [4] and [18] of my previous judgment) sabotaged or attempted to sabotage the placements which the court had found best met HM's needs. I am left with no option but to put in place the protective measures which, I am satisfied, are essential if PM is to be prevented from similar sabotage in future. I recognise also that the injunctions interfere to a very significant extent with PM's relationship with HM, his daughter, and in a manner which requires cogent justification if there is not to be a breach of his (and, indeed, her) rights under Article 8 of the Convention. But the immediate imperatives are:

i) to enable HM to become settled – settled both generally and in her new placement at Y – following the massive disruption to her life, routines and other family relationships resulting from PM's abduction and keeping of her in Israel from October 2009 until April 2010; and

ii) to ensure that HM is safe and is not again abducted by PM.

The Official Solicitor, supported by the States of Guernsey, submits that injunctions in these terms are necessary and proportionate in seeking to achieve these essential objectives. I agree. In my judgment they are necessary both to further HM's best interests and, indeed, to protect her own Article 8 rights.

7. I hope that the time will come when PM is able to demonstrate that the regime constraining him can appropriately and, from HM's perspective, safely be relaxed. But for the time being I cannot ignore his response to the order I made in September 2009 – an order which, for all his subsequent bluster and abuse, was much less restrictive of him and his involvement with Y than had been proposed by the Official Solicitor. He has defied the court; he has abused the trust which the parties and the court placed in him by not subjecting him previously to injunctive restraints; he has abused his parental duties and responsibilities to HM and acted in a manner quite plainly contrary to her best interests; and he has twice sabotaged the arrangements that the court has put in place in order to further HM's best interests. In the circumstances, and HM's safety being at stake, I must err, if at all, on the side of caution. If in the result this all presses hard on PM then he has to realise that he has only himself to blame. My purpose, I stress, is not to be punitive but merely to ensure that HM is safe and happy and able to enjoy the family life with her mother and sister that PM so ruthlessly and selfishly denied her.

8. The injunctions in paragraphs 12 and 13 of the order, restraining PM from publishing and communicating various information, require some further explanation.

9. At an earlier stage in the litigation, on 28 February 2007, Sumner J had made an order which, so far as material for present purposes, was in the following terms:

“The Second Defendant shall be referred to as ‘H’, the Claimant as ‘PM’ and the First Defendant as ‘KH’ and nothing shall be reported that would identify H.”

10. Following the hearing before me in August 2009 both KH and the Official Solicitor expressed concerns that PM was breaking this order by sending emails to various people containing details about the case and about HM and the other parties. I was sceptical as to whether the order would actually bear the weight which the Official Solicitor was seemingly...