The High Court has found Tarbutus Limited entitled to injunctive relief over an apartment in Ballycummin, County Limerick, after rejecting former owner Conor Hogan’s challenges to its registered title.
In a judgment delivered on 15 December 2021, Mr Justice David Holland said the folio for Apartment 9B, Ballycummin Village, recorded Tarbutus as full owner and was conclusive evidence of title under section 31 of the Registration of Title Act 1964. The court found Mr Hogan had failed to establish a good defence to the company’s claim.
Tarbutus brought the plenary action seeking orders in substance restraining trespass. It had acquired the apartment by a transfer from Tanager DAC, which exercised its power of sale as registered owner of a charge. The court said it would generally grant the injunctions sought. It directed Tarbutus to send Mr Hogan a draft order, including on costs; any issues not agreed were to be addressed by written submissions within 14 days. The judgment did not specify the final wording of the orders.
Mr Hogan argued that the proceedings were an abuse of process because he had earlier issued separate proceedings seeking rectification of the register. He also challenged the transfer of the charge to Tanager, the sale price and process, errors in the transfer document, and Tarbutus’s status as a dormant company. He alleged fraud and deception by Tarbutus and others.
The judge rejected those arguments. He held that the registered folio established Tarbutus’s title and that the alleged defects in the underlying transactions did not displace it in this action. He found no evidence of fraud or deception by Tarbutus or anyone else. The contract of sale had not been produced at trial, but the judge said its absence did not affect the registered title.
The apartment sold for €24,000. Mr Hogan asserted that its market value was about €180,000, but did not provide admissible valuation evidence or evidence establishing his claimed loss or equity. The judge accepted that the sale was not a public sale and noted that the company’s director described bidding after due diligence on a portfolio of distressed properties. The judgment said a private contract sale was permitted and found no evidence of fraud in the transaction.
The court found Mr Hogan had occupied the apartment since at least July 2020, after tenants left, but was a trespasser at least from service of the proceedings because his registered title had been cancelled. The judge accepted that Mr Hogan first learned of the sale during events on 14 July 2020, when Tarbutus’s property manager and a locksmith attended. The Gardaí treated the dispute as civil and left; the judge said he did not need to resolve differences in the parties’ accounts of what was said.
The decision concerns Tarbutus’s claim as registered owner in this plenary action. The judgment left the precise form of the orders and costs for subsequent agreement or written submissions.