The owner of Dundalk Football Club claims a debt firm has “wrongfully” purported to appoint a receiver over his property and obtained a High Court judgment against him by “surprise and/or mistake”.
The club owner, barrister John Temple, told the High Court on Wednesday that Mars Capital Finance Ireland sought vacant possession of his property at Hoey’s Lane in Dundalk, Co Louth, and has been threatening him with attachment and committal to prison proceedings.
He said it sent him a copy of a High Court order, dated from last March 4th, requiring him to deliver defence and counterclaim documents to Mars Capital by March 8th in response to its proceedings seeking possession of the rental premises.
In an affidavit to the court, Mr Temple said he complied with Ms Justice Emily Egan’s document delivery order and received confirmation that his papers were delivered to Mars Capital’s solicitors by registered post on March 8th.
Despite this, he said, a receiver from Crowe Ireland advised his Hoey’s Lane tenant last month that he has taken possession of the property and that all further rents must be remitted to his office.
Mr Temple said Mars Capital is not entitled to possession and he was “unaware” that the company had obtained judgment against him “by surprise and/or mistake” in the possession proceedings.
He said he discovered by searching the High Court’s online case directory system that Mars Capital had filed an affidavit it had not copied to him and that it had obtained the judgment.
On Wednesday, Mr Justice Garrett Simons granted Mr Temple permission to serve Mars Capital with notice of a motion scheduled for next Tuesday. The application was made while only Mr Temple was in court.
The barrister and club owner, who has an address in Riverstown, Dundalk, plans to ask the court to pause the effects of the “surprise” judgment pending the hearing of his appeal in Mars Capital’s possession proceedings.
Those proceedings arise out of a 2007 loan of €254,000 advanced to Mr Temple from EBS Building Society for his purchase of the Hoey’s Lane property.
EBS Mortgage Finance, which purportedly acquired his loan, secured a Circuit Court order in December 2019 directing Mr Temple to deliver up vacant possession of the Hoey’s Lane property.
Mr Temple appealed against the Circuit Court decision and challenged EBS Mortgage’s subsequent purported sale of the alleged outstanding loan to Mars Capital.
In March 2023, following a short hearing, Mr Justice Simons ordered that a full or “plenary” hearing of the appeal was required. This was because the limited and “ambiguous” evidence before him did not confirm Mars Capital owns the debt upon which it based its application for a possession order.
The judge said the most the evidence before him at that hearing established was that Mars Capital is the registered owner of a charge on the lands. A redacted deed of transfer Mars Capital exhibited to the court “does not establish that ownership of the debt has passed to it”, the judge said.
He was not satisfied Mars Capital had, “as of yet”, sufficiently proved its case but was also not satisfied, “as of yet”, that Mr Temple made out a defence on the basis of alleging the debt had not been transferred.
The judge noted that EBS Mortgage had claimed before the Circuit Court that the principal sum from the 2007 loan had become due as Mr Temple was more than three months in arrears.
In his recent affidavit, Mr Temple said he should have been offered a tracker rate at the time of borrowing but he made his repayments in accordance with the interest rate applied. He alleged he at some point discovered he overpaid EBS Building Society by about €26,000.
He said that, following on from the March 2023 judgment, both sides defaulted in filing their legal papers.
He said Mars Capital issued a motion last January seeking judgment against him on the basis of his alleged default in filing a defence. However, Ms Justice Egan gave him until March 8th to deliver his papers, he said, adding: “I deny that I am in breach of the order”.
