Mohamed Hassan El Haddad v Khulood Abdulla Hassan Al Rostamani & Ors

A claim to set aside a judgment for fraud requires genuinely new evidence of conscious and deliberate dishonesty which was material and causative of the judgment. Evidence that merely strengthens the unsuccessful case advanced previously cannot support a fresh action.

Witnesses, advocates and solicitors enjoy threshold immunity from civil proceedings concerning evidence prepared or given, and submissions made, in judicial proceedings. The immunity is not lost merely because fraud, conspiracy or breach of duties to the court is alleged.

The claimant sought to set aside an earlier judgment concerning an alleged English partnership, alleging that all eighteen defendants had procured it by fraud. The earlier judgment had held that decisions of the Dubai courts created an issue estoppel and had declined jurisdiction over the partnership claim.

The present proceedings were brought principally against the lawyers who had represented the defendants in the earlier jurisdiction challenge. Applications were made to strike out the claim and, alternatively, for reverse summary judgment. The central issues were immunity, joinder and whether the pleaded fraud claim disclosed reasonable grounds.

1. Applications granted. The claim against the Ninth to Eighteenth Defendants was struck out.
2. Witnesses, advocates and legal representatives have threshold immunity from civil proceedings relating to evidence prepared or given, or submissions made, in judicial proceedings. The immunity applies even where fraud, conspiracy or knowing deception is alleged. The limited exceptions in Arthur J.S. Hall & Co v Simons, [2002] 1 AC 615 and Jones v Kaney, [2011] 2 AC 398 did not assist an opposing litigant.
3. A lawyer’s duty to the court does not generally require investigation of the truth of the client’s case. Lawyers may advance factual and legal arguments based on instructions, documents and expert evidence, subject to the prohibition on knowingly misleading the court.
4. On the assumption that immunity did not apply, joinder would not itself have justified striking out a credible fraud claim involving the lawyers.
5. Under Takhar v Gracefield Developments Ltd, [2019] UKSC 13, fresh evidence must establish conscious and deliberate dishonesty, materiality and causation. Evidence merely strengthening the earlier case is insufficient.
6. The new material did not show knowing falsity or causation. The claim was therefore also abusive and, in substance, a concealed attempt to reopen the earlier decision.
7. The fraud allegations lacked particulars capable of supporting an inference of dishonesty rather than innocent error or negligence.

First-instance decision. The court granted the applications of the Ninth to Eighteenth Defendants and struck out the claim against them.