Ewing v News International Ltd & Ors (22 July 2008)

The claimant is a "vexatious litigant" within the meaning of Section 42 of the Supreme Court Act 1981, pursuant to an order dated 12 February 1990. In that proceedings it was revealed that, up to that point, the claimant had pursued a total of 37 claims.

It was also the stated "policy" of the claimant that he would "make the proceedings deliberately as expensive and convoluted for the opposition as...can possibly make them with every conceivable objection and point being taken, no matter how minor" and that he "intend to make the proceedings in the Westminster County Court as embarrassing as...possibly can". The Court found as a fact that the claimant was a "serial litigator" who did not pay the cost awarded against him.

The 1990 court order seemed to have little impact on the claimant who then made at least 19 separate applications for leave to commence various proceedings. These applications were largely unsuccessful and variously described by the court as "quite unarguable on the merits"; "unarguable"; "no arguable basis for challenge"; "none of the claimant's proposed challenges are even arguably sustainable".

A particular field of activity in which the claimant had engaged in were in relation to planning application objection, sometime made under the name of "Euston Trust", an unincorporated and unregulated body run from a North London council flat by the claimant. The Euston Trust's former secretary was a man (KH) who was convicted of indecently assaulting teenage boys and jailed for six years in 2006.

The application in this case was supported by inter alia a statement from an associate of the claimant, PH, who was himself a vexatious litigant.

The claimant also told the court that he had issued similar proceedings against the one of the defendants in Belfast and in Scotland (the order making him a vexatious litigant was only in force in England and Wales).

In addition, the judgment revealed that the claimant made a formal complaint to the Attorney General for not showing any interest and had chosen not to file any evidence in those proceedings. It also appeared from the claimant's witness statement that he had also notified the Information Commissioner and either commenced, or intended to commence, some unspecified further proceedings involving the Treasury Solicitor for providing to the defendants a copy of the judgment of the Divisional Court in 1989 (a public document), when the claimant was made a vexatious litigant.

The claimant also provided lengthy and extensive further submission after the conclusion of the oral hearing, notwithstanding that the judge had ordered him not to do so.

The claimant obviously had a lot of training and was described as long ago as 1991 by another judge (Lord Donaldson MR) as an 'experienced and well informed litigant'. He appeared in person and was capable to making extensive written submission and pleadings as well as making argument by reference to decided cases. Indeed the judge mentioned Brian Maccaba v Diane Lichtenstein, an authority first drawn to the judge's attention by the claimant. The judge also mentioned that the claimant had "detailed knowledge of the forms and procedure of civil proceedings".

In the end, the judge patiently but had no difficulty rejecting the claimant's application for leave to commence legal proceedings on the grounds that the claimant was time barred and also that the claim had no reasonable prospect of success and was an abuse of process.

The judge considered that the character and conduct of the claimant were relevant, including his stated policy whereby he deliberately caused the other parties to incur large sums of unnecessarily costs; his stated policy of refusing to pay any costs awarded against him; his failure to pay the costs; and his refusal to answer the question raised by the other side as to outstanding costs orders against him. The judge considered the evidence was overwhelming that, whatever the outcome of the proceedings, the claimant would not pay the costs that he had caused the other parties to incur. The judge also did not believe that the claimant was truthful or would conduct the proceedings in an appropriate manner.

The judge was also in no doubt that, if permission were given to bring action, it would become a personal spat between two former associates, one of whom (the claimant) is a convicted fraudster, and the other (KH) a convicted of sex offender and that it was "not for the defendants to pay for the privilege of watching that vendetta played out (which is the likely outcome, since neither man has the means or, in the claimant's case, the will, to pay the defendants' costs), and certainly not for the court to provide a referee, pitch and staff to allow such a dispute to be hosted at public expense."