Lake v Crawford (No 2) [2010] NSWSC 419

New South Wales Supreme Court

CITATION : Lake v Crawford (No 2) [2010] NSWSC 419

HEARING DATE(S) : 30 April 2010

JUDGMENT DATE : 7 May 2010

JUDGMENT OF : Harrison J

DECISION : 1. Interim injunction granted 23 April 2010 discharged. 2. Plaintiff to pay the defendants' costs of and incidental to their appearance on 30 April 2010.

CATCHWORDS : PRACTICE & PROCEDURE – freezing orders – UCPR 25.11 – where first defendant received gift of $3.9M from the plaintiff's wife – first defendant purchased property for $1.345M in name of second defendant using part of the funds - where first defendant sole shareholder and director of second defendant - where plaintiff alleges defendants likely to dissipate assets if not restrained– where no evidence of past or likely future dissipation – whether sufficient evidence of danger of dissipation of assets to warrant continuation of ex parte injunctions - whether failure by defendants to undertake not to dispose of assets gives rise to any inference adverse to them – interim injunction discharged.

LEGISLATION CITED : Civil Procedure Act 2005 Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 2005

CATEGORY : Procedural and other rulings

Lake v Crawford [2010] NSWSC 232 Lunn v All Starr Video Ltd (1993) The Times, 25 March 1993 CASES CITED : Ninemia Maritime Corporation v Trave Schiffahrtsgesellschaft mbH und Co KG (The Niedersachsen) [1983] 1 WLR 1412; [1984] 1 All ER 398 Patterson v BTR Engineering (Aust) Ltd (1989) 18 NSWLR 319 Turner v Universal Home Loans Pty Ltd [2004] NSWSC 936

Desmond Kenneth Lake by his tutors Gregory Grant Shand and Helen Keilar PARTIES : Ngaope Hoia Crawford (aka Sonny Crawford) (First Defendant) Delcort Investments Pty Ltd (Second Defendant)