West End law firm Jeffrey Green Russell (JGR) has fended off a Court of Appeal negligence claim brought by a former client, Iranian businessman Ali Taefi.
Three appeal judges upheld a November 2004 county court ruling that JGR was not liable for more than £45,000 in costs that were incurred by Taefi during a dispute with his landlord, Pegasi Management Co, over unpaid rent at his central London flat.
International property investor Taefi used the flat in Grosvenor Square, W1, as his London base between 1994 and 1998. In October 1998, Pegasi sent him a final rent invoice for £12,734, which Taefi claimed that he had not received.
In the ensuing dispute, Taefi blamed JGR for its failure to settle the claim. He alleged that JGR had instructed him to ask Pegasi to deduct from the unpaid rent his own legal costs of £550. After Pegasi refused, the dispute escalated, resulting in substantial costs for both parties that the court eventually ordered Taefi to pay.
However, JGR claimed that it had been Taefi’s idea to ask Pegasi to pay his legal costs as a term of the settlement.
Lloyd LJ said that the county court judge had been “fully justified” in concluding that no advice given to Taefi by his solicitor would have “deterred him from taking the line that he did”.
“The findings of fact were open to the judge on the evidence, and were reached by a proper and fair examination of that evidence,” he said.
He added that, even if the judge had been wrong in his conclusion that no breach of duty by JGR had occurred, the breaches had not contributed to Taefi’s loss.
Taefi v Jeffrey Green Russell Court of Appeal (Brooke, Tuckey and Lloyd LJJ) 25 July 2005.
Michael Soole QC and Alexander Hill-Smith (instructed by Judge Sykes Frixou) appeared for the appellant; John Powell QC and Michael Roberts (instructed by Jeffrey Green Russell) appeared for the respondent.
References: EGi Legal News 25/07/05