Glanville v Mahmoud

In a fact-finding hearing, a court should assess disputed recollection with caution. Documentary evidence, together with known or probable facts, may provide a more reliable foundation for findings than confident recollection of conversations or events. Cross-examination remains important, principally to test the documentary record and assess a witness’s evidence and reliability.

Orders concerning removal of children must use precise territorial language. United Kingdom and England and Wales are not interchangeable. Standard wording permitting limited travel should not appear in an order that also contains an injunction against removal.

The proceedings concerned Adam Glanville, a child aged six, and disputes between his parents concerning alleged child abduction, threats to kill and compliance with orders restricting removal from the jurisdiction.

The court conducted a three-day fact-finding hearing limited principally to the serious allegations. The father denied threatening the mother. The mother had previously taken the child to Saudi Arabia, Oman and Egypt, and later travelled with him to Northern Ireland. The central issues were whether the mother had wrongfully removed or retained the child, whether the father had threatened to kill her, and what arrangements were required to protect the child pending further welfare proceedings.

1. Fact-finding approach. The court applied the approach described by Leggatt J in Gestmin SGPS SA v Credit Suisse (UK) Ltd [2013] EWHC 3560. Memories of past beliefs and conversations are vulnerable to alteration. Findings should therefore be based principally on contemporaneous documents, inferences from the documentary record, and known or probable facts. Witness recollection may assist, but confidence and apparent honesty do not by themselves establish reliability.
2. Findings on the allegations. The court rejected the allegation that the father had threatened to kill the mother. It found that the mother had wrongfully removed and retained the child in Egypt, in breach of the applicable orders. It further found that her later journey to Northern Ireland was intended to facilitate travel across the open border into the Republic of Ireland and outside the court’s jurisdiction.
3. Standard of proof. The court applied the balance of probabilities. It was unnecessary to prove the mother’s purpose to the criminal standard of proof beyond reasonable doubt.
4. Drafting of removal orders. The court observed that orders should distinguish carefully between the United Kingdom and England and Wales. A standard rubric permitting removal for less than one month is inconsistent with an injunction prohibiting removal and should not be included in the same order.
5. Consequences. The mother’s contact with the child was to remain supervised and was not increased. The court required safeguards against further removal, directed that the judgment be available to professionals working with the family, and adjourned the proceedings for further case management and welfare determination.

Not stated in the judgment.