Crowther v Crowther & Ors

In financial remedy proceedings, a High Court judge should not transfer related Admiralty proceedings into the Family Division without the issue first being considered by an Admiralty judge. The court should avoid adopting a provisional view that third-party assets are beneficially owned by a spouse where ownership is disputed.

A third-party injunction should not remain in force without at least a threshold evidential basis for a current intention to defeat the spouse’s financial claims. Where that basis is absent, the injunction should be discharged.

The proceedings concerned matrimonial financial claims arising from a shipping business. The wife alleged that ships legally owned by Steven Knight and companies associated with him were beneficially owned by the husband and wife. Knight and his companies had issued related proceedings in the Admiralty Court seeking declarations concerning ownership and disposal of the ships.

The wife applied for those proceedings to be transferred to the Family Division. The court also considered freezing injunctions affecting Knight and his companies, who argued that the injunctions threatened the solvency of the shipping enterprise.

1. Transfer of Admiralty proceedings. The judge declined to transfer the Admiralty proceedings to the Family Division. He expressed no concluded view on whether he possessed that power or on the merits of any transfer. The first consideration should be by a judge sitting in the Admiralty Court, with all parties able to develop their arguments there.
2. Third-party injunctions. Although the injunctions against Knight and his companies did not fall directly within Matrimonial Causes Act 1973, s 37, there was some analogy with that provision. It was not appropriate to leave the injunctions in place unless there was at least a threshold level of evidence of a current intention by Knight or his companies to defeat the wife’s financial claims.
3. The court was not satisfied that there was such an intention or any real evidence of deviousness. The arrangements had been established in 2012, before the marriage had seriously deteriorated, and the wife appeared to have been aware of them. Maintaining the structure’s solvency could itself protect any beneficial interest she might ultimately establish.
4. The wife’s application to transfer the Admiralty proceedings was refused. All subsisting injunctions affecting Knight and the relevant companies were discharged.