Ritchie: Appeal rejected with regret
The High Court has highlighted the “fishy” role of two solicitors in a housing possession case in what “looks like a stitch-up” of the occupant by her ex-husband.
However, Mr Justice Ritchie held, with “regret”, that he could not find for Kamal Egbuna because she had failed to establish that she had a beneficial ownership of the property in Hertfordshire.
On appeal from His Honour Judge Murch in Watford, the court heard that Ms Egbuna’s ex-husband, Chidi Daniels, obtained the divorce in Nigeria.
Ms Egbuna said she did not take part in that case or bring ancillary relief proceedings in England and Wales – the failure to do the latter, Ritchie J said, was the “root” of her problem.
Some years later, in 2021, Mr Daniels transferred the property – which he owned but where Ms Egbuna and her children lived – to a company called IJ Investments (IJI). This was set up and owned by two solicitors from North London law firm Solomon Shepherd – Isaac Agyeman and Jacqueline Oke.
HHJ Murch found it was a property development company that only bought this one property and even then did not develop it. Further, before buying it, the solicitors did not even go inside the premises or have a survey carried out. “I consider these facts to be quite remarkable,” said Ritchie J.
Ms Egbuna described the transaction as “fishy” and the judge said “HHJ Murch found quite a lot of evidence to support the fishy transaction assertion, which included a £1,000 payment in Mr Daniels’s bank statements made back in 2016 to the solicitors’ firm”.
The property was sold with vacant possession and about a month later Ms Oke turned up at the property “and allegedly was surprised to find that the appellant was there living in it”.
Ritchie J said: “You would expect, in the normal course, that such a purchaser, who had just bought at arms’ length with vacant possession, would go back to the seller and say: ‘You’re in breach of the sale contract. You haven’t given me vacant possession. Now I have got to enter into protracted litigation with a mother and her children. She may be on legal aid. This may cost me a lot of money. Even if I win, you will have to compensate me’.
“It is another very fishy aspect of this case that they did not do that, quite the opposite. They did not sue Mr Daniels for breach of the contract for failing to give vacant possession, they sought possession against the appellant and her children.
“As the appellant so rightly put it, not only did they do that, but Mr Daniels helped them. He provided a witness statement and his bank statements. The very person who they could have been suing.”
IJI issued proceedings in July 2022 to obtain possession. Despite HHJ Murch’s concerns, and his suspicions that the solicitors had known Mr Daniels before the transaction – both claimed to be unaware of the 2016 payment, which HHJ Murch described as “remarkable” – the one element of her defence Ms Egbuna could not prove was a common intention that she should have beneficial ownership of the property.
“He did not make that finding with any enthusiasm,” noted Ritchie J.
He added: “As the appellant put it, beautifully, in her carefully prepared submissions, it was fishy and the judge found it was fishy, but there was not enough evidence to take it further [and find collusion].”
On appeal, Ritchie J said the conduct of IJI “looks like a stitch-up of the appellant by her ex-husband”.
Had these been ancillary relief proceedings, Ms Egbuna would not have needed to prove a beneficial ownership, but for possession proceedings she did and he agreed with HHJ Murch that she had failed to do so.
“Like the judge, I am sorry that the defendant’s case failed. Like the judge, I do not want to see a mother and children thrown out on the street, but the power I have on appeal is firmly structured, and I have to follow it…
“So, I regret to say that I am going to dismiss this appeal.”
He refused to order that Ms Egbuna pay costs because of IJI’s failure to put in the required summary costs schedule. “I do not think it is appropriate for a litigant in person, who is as I understand it on benefits, to not have a costs schedule sent to them.”
We have approached Solomon Shepherd for comment.
Disgraceful