The High Court has dismissed Rosarie O’Mahony’s appeals concerning a possession order for a property at Goggins Hill, Ballinhassig, Co. Cork, and found that Start Mortgages DAC is entitled to possession. It also set aside two orders by a Master extending time to appeal, including one relating to a costs order that the court said had never been made.
Mr Justice Mark Heslin delivered judgment on 4 November 2022 after a two-day hearing listed for 18 and 19 October. O’Mahony did not attend. The judge considered and refused her application to adjourn, then proceeded with a de novo hearing of the possession appeal and related applications.
The original possession order was made by Cork Circuit Court on 2 October 2018 in favour of Permanent TSB plc, with a nine-month stay on execution. The High Court reviewed the loan and mortgage evidence, the registered charge and the history of the claim. It concluded that the secured money was due and that the possession application had been made bona fide to realise the security.
PTSB transferred the loan and charge to Start on 1 February 2019. The judgment records that Start was registered as owner of the charge on 28 March 2019. The judge upheld the Circuit Court’s substitution of Start for PTSB and dismissed O’Mahony’s challenge to a separate High Court substitution order. He also dismissed her appeal against the 2018 possession order, concluding after the de novo hearing that Start was entitled to possession.
The court rejected O’Mahony’s contention that costs or expenses from earlier possession proceedings, discontinued in 2015, barred the later claim or justified a stay. It said no costs order had been made on 2 October 2018. A litigant in person could seek assessment of actual and necessary outlay through the Circuit Court procedures, but the court found no evidence that O’Mahony had taken the required steps to have those expenses assessed.
The judge allowed Start’s appeals against two Master’s orders dated 22 January 2019 and set them aside. One order purported to extend time to appeal the possession order; the other referred to a Circuit Court costs order dated 2 October 2018, which the High Court found did not exist. O’Mahony’s appeal concerning that purported costs order was dismissed, as was her appeal against the substitution of Start in the Circuit Court proceedings.
The judgment directed the parties to try to agree the terms of a draft order within 14 days. The judge expressed a preliminary view that costs should follow the event, while inviting written submissions if the parties disputed costs.