The Court of Appeal has dismissed John Kelly’s appeal against a High Court judgment ordering him to pay Cave Projects Limited €11,407,826.09 plus costs. The appeal court left the High Court order in place; it did not make a separate determination on whether Cave Projects was authorised to provide credit servicing.
The claim arose from loans made to five borrowers, including Kelly, and a September 2007 facility for €12,065,630, which included an additional €600,000. The appeal judgment records that Kelly admitted under cross-examination that he signed the facility, the funds were drawn down, the loan related to Bank of Ireland account 23794421, and the amount due at the time of a January 2011 demand was €11,785,543.14. He did not dispute that amount was repayable to the bank. The High Court later entered judgment for the lower figure after payments reduced the debt.
Cave Projects said it acquired the debt and security through transfers from the National Asset Management Agency and its entity National Asset Loan Management. The Court of Appeal said evidence supported the High Court’s findings that the account and related security were acquired by NAMA and then transferred to Cave Projects in January 2013. It also held that Kelly’s arguments about notice of those transfers could not be pursued for the first time on appeal; in any event, the relevant NAMA legislation did not require the notices he argued were missing.
The appeal court said Kelly’s admissions meant it was unnecessary to decide whether the High Court had correctly applied the 2020 legislation on business records. It added that, even without the admissions, the trial judge was entitled to rely on the loan and account records and evidence of the parties’ course of dealing, while excluding the demand letter from the statutory presumption for business records.
Kelly also raised issues concerning settlements with other borrowers, alleged confidentiality breaches, property management and rent, and the company’s regulatory status. The court noted that several arguments had not been pleaded or supported by evidence at trial, or were not proper issues for the appeal. Kelly had handed in a September 2023 Central Bank press release concerning Cave Projects’ authorisation status, but the court said it did not need to determine the regulatory issue.
The appeal was from a High Court judgment delivered in December 2022 after a six-day plenary hearing. The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal.