The Court of Appeal has refused Colm Murphy’s applications to introduce transcripts from separate Law Society proceedings as new evidence in his appeal and to obtain records about an anonymised solicitor’s health and retirement.
In a judgment delivered on 31 October 2024, Mr Justice Charles Meenan said Murphy had not shown that the transcripts could not have been obtained with reasonable diligence for use at his High Court trial. The court also found no information showing that the transcripts would probably have had an important influence on the outcome of his case.
Murphy is appealing a High Court judgment of 31 July 2019 that dismissed his claim after a hearing lasting about 15 days in 2018. He is also appealing the High Court’s dismissal, on 26 July 2021, of a “re-entry motion”. The Court of Appeal judgment addressed six motions concerning those appeals: three seeking to introduce further evidence and three seeking discovery. At the hearing, Murphy pursued a narrower request to admit transcripts and pleadings from proceedings involving solicitor Dennis McMahon and the Law Society.
Murphy alleges that Solicitor X, who acted for the Law Society in proceedings involving him, engaged in serious wrongdoing, including knowingly relying on forged documents. Those are Murphy’s allegations; the judgment did not make findings that they were true. The court noted that the McMahon proceedings, which began in 2011 and concerned the handling of settlement money, appeared to have settled before conclusion. The judgment says it had no information about the settlement terms.
The court relied on Murphy’s answers at a 2022 hearing, which it said established that he knew of the McMahon proceedings as early as 2015. It concluded that he could have obtained the transcripts for use at trial. It also noted that he had not pursued a discovery application he had sought in 2021.
The discovery request sought documents about Solicitor X’s health in connection with her Law Society employment and medically grounded retirement, including correspondence, internal records and medical reports. The court said those records were not shown to be relevant or necessary to the appeal. Applying the principle that discovery in this context should be granted only where absolutely necessary, it found Murphy had not established that threshold.
The court refused both applications. It said the Law Society was entitled to its costs as the successful party, but allowed Murphy 14 days to file written submissions disputing costs, followed by a further 14 days for the Law Society to respond. The judgment did not finally determine costs.