The High Court has found that ACC Bank proved its claim over six loans advanced to Sam Deacon and ordered judgment against him. It also ordered judgment against Ben Deacon on the first loan, which was made jointly to both defendants.
The judgment, delivered by Mr Justice Ryan on 28 June 2013, concerns a claim for €3.495 million said to be due under loans advanced between April 2007 and August 2008. The bank said both defendants defaulted on the first loan, while Sam Deacon defaulted on the remaining five. Demand notices were served in March 2011.
Sam Deacon disputed that he had agreed to the specific loan terms, particularly for loans 5 and 6, which replaced earlier pension-backed loans. He alleged that the bank’s records were unreliable and relied on a handwriting witness who questioned some signatures and document details. The court found the witness’s expertise and methods unpersuasive. It also noted that the witness had not seen the documents held in the solicitors’ file.
The bank’s case was supported by evidence from Deacon’s former solicitors. They said he signed the facility acceptances in their presence or brought signed documents to them, and they returned them to the bank as completed. The court also considered the related mortgage documents, correspondence, loan drawdowns and Deacon’s use of the money to buy land. It concluded that the bank had proved the agreements and their terms. The judge said the claim concerned proof of the loan agreements, which could be established through oral evidence and copies, rather than production of a single original document for each loan.
The court rejected Deacon’s arguments that alleged breaches of lending codes, financial advice and mis-selling defeated the repayment claim. It found no established statutory or regulatory breach that provided a defence. The judge also said that documents concerning other ACC customers named Samuel Deacon had been wrongly disclosed and that this was a serious privacy interference for those customers, but it did not affect Sam Deacon’s liability.
The court’s conclusion was that the bank had proved its case on all six loans and that none of Sam Deacon’s arguments provided a valid defence. The judgment directed that judgment be entered for ACC on loans 1 to 6 against Sam Deacon and jointly and severally against Ben Deacon on loan 1. The supplied judgment does not state the amount of the judgment separately from the claim total.