The High Court has refused Pepper Finance Corporation (Ireland) DAC permission to enforce a €646,913.72 judgment entered against Seamus (otherwise Shay) Sweeney in 2012, finding that about eight years of the delay had not been adequately explained.
The ruling, delivered by Mr Justice Garrett Simons on 16 August 2023, concerned a motion filed on 13 April 2022. Pepper Finance sought to replace ACC Bank plc as plaintiff and then obtain leave under Order 42, rule 24 of the Rules of the Superior Courts to issue execution on the judgment. The judgment had been entered in the Central Office on 12 September 2012 after Mr Sweeney failed to enter an appearance. A judgment mortgage was certified that December.
The judge said an application for leave is required when execution has not taken place within six years. The court must consider whether the delay has been explained and whether the debtor would suffer prejudice. The threshold for an explanation is low, but it must be met.
Pepper Finance relied on ACC Bank’s restructuring and loss of its banking licence, staff reductions and administrative difficulties, mortgage-arrears rules, the sale of a mortgaged property in County Limerick, and transfers of the loan portfolio. It also cited identity checks, the opportunity for Mr Sweeney to engage about the loan, and public-health restrictions during the pandemic.
The judge found these matters did not explain the years of delay before March 2020. The 2012 judgment was already in place, so the cited pre-proceedings rules and the absence of a banking licence did not prevent enforcement. Staff shortages had not been substantiated and, in any event, were not a reason attributable to the debtor. The bank could have pursued judgment enforcement alongside the receiver’s sale of the mortgaged property. That property sold for €140,000 gross, while the balance was reported as €441,320.94 in August 2019. The loan transfers also did not account for the delay, the judge said.
The court refused leave to issue execution. As a result, it did not determine the detail of the substitution application, which would have had no practical benefit if the judgment could not be enforced. All relief sought in the motion was refused. The defendant was awarded his costs of the motion, including reserved costs, with the amount to be adjudicated if the parties could not agree. The costs order is stayed in the event of an appeal.