The High Court lifted an interim order freezing money from the sale of Trinity Haus in Dunboyne and an insurance claim after finding that Stephen Mahon had not established grounds for a continued injunction. The court said his claims about his entitlement to the money raised issues for trial, but the evidence did not show a real risk that the defendants would dissipate assets to avoid a judgment.
Mahon had lived at the property with his family from 2016. Under a February 2022 settlement agreement, Yeronga Limited was to sell it for the best reasonably achievable open-market price, with the first €200,000 of net sale proceeds going to the company and the balance to Mahon. The agreement set a minimum sale price of €500,000.
A sale agreed at about €810,000 in late 2022 fell through after a fire. The property later sold for €500,000. Yeronga also received €231,399 net from an insurance claim, according to evidence exchanged in the application. The defendants had spent €103,397.10 of the insurance money before the interim order was made.
Mahon argued that he had a claim to part of the insurance proceeds as well as the sale money. The judge found a fair issue to be tried over whether the insurance funds were held for Mahon, whether retaining them amounted to unjust enrichment, or whether selling without using them to repair the property breached the settlement’s requirement to seek the best reasonably achievable price. The defendants disputed his position and asserted that Mahon had breached the settlement; those claims were not decided at this hearing.
The judge held that damages would be an adequate remedy if Mahon succeeded at trial. For a Mareva injunction, he also had to show a real risk that assets would be put beyond reach to defeat a judgment. The court found that the defendants’ efforts to access funds frozen under a separate family-law order, their handling of the sale and insurance money, and their foreign investors’ ownership did not establish that risk.
The court also noted that Yeronga owned a development site at Berryfields, Ferns, in County Wexford. A valuation report put its value at €570,000. The judge said the site was an asset that could not readily be dissipated and rejected, for this interim application, Mahon’s claim that it had no value.
The judge found that Mahon had breached the duty of full and frank disclosure when seeking the original order without disclosing the site, despite relying on the claim that the sale and insurance proceeds were Yeronga’s only assets in the State. The judge did not decide the defendants’ separate argument that the injunction should be refused on other nondisclosure grounds.
The court vacated the interim order made on 30 May 2023. It said the injunction application could be renewed if evidence of a risk of dissipation emerged, and offered to hear the parties on directions to facilitate an early trial. The judgment did not determine the ultimate rights to the proceeds or the scope of the separate family-law order.