The High Court has dismissed Ben Gilroy’s application to set aside earlier orders in proceedings brought by Allied Irish Banks and later continued by Everyday Finance DAC. Gilroy alleged that Mr Justice McGovern was biased because lawyers for the plaintiffs had previously acted for the judge’s wife, and because of how the judge handled earlier hearings.
In a judgment delivered on 8 April 2022, Mr Justice Denis McDonald rejected both the objective-bias and actual-bias claims. He found no cogent link between the lawyers’ earlier work for the judge’s wife and the decisions in the case. The source records that the substantive claims in the earlier partnership proceedings had been resolved years before Gilroy was joined as a defendant in May 2017, and that there was no evidence anything remained to be done in those proceedings when the first order affecting him was made.
Gilroy also relied on alleged favouritism, hostility, interruptions during cross-examination and the judge’s decision to send hearing transcripts to the Revenue Commissioners and the Director of Public Prosecutions. The court said adverse decisions or one side succeeding in applications did not, by themselves, establish bias. It found no sustainable evidence supporting the allegations of hostility or ill will, and said the transcript referral had a rational basis in an inconsistency between information given to the court and information in a community-service assessment report.
The court noted that Gilroy had previously been found in criminal contempt twice, and that those findings were final and conclusive unless he succeeded in his bias challenge. The judgment did not make a further contempt finding on this application. It also noted a prior order requiring Gilroy to obtain permission before bringing motions against the plaintiff. Although he had not sought that permission, the judge proceeded to decide the application on its merits in light of how it had been argued and his designation to hear it.
The court dismissed the application and ordered specified paragraphs and sentences in Gilroy’s affidavits struck out as scandalous. It did not decide costs at that stage: any party seeking costs had to apply by 4 May 2022, after which the opposing party could respond and the court would issue a ruling.