Interpreting Court Order - Draft

Hey Guys,

to Summarize:

My father in his 70's was scammed out of a fairly large amount of money over 2 1/2 years ago. After a long wait for a court case to take place (Due to covid & the civil unrest in Hong Kong) he finally had his day in court on the 31st of January with the Judge ruling in favour to return said frozen money back into my fathers account.

A draft court order has been put together an will be handed to the bank to execute on in a weeks time. There is some wording in the court order that I am trying to get clarity on that I hope someone who has a legal background might be able to interpret. That wording is the following:

"The 1st Defendant do pay the Plaintiff's costs of and incidental to these proceedings on an indemnity basis with certificate of counsel, to be taxed if not agreed; there be no order as to costs as between the Plaintiff and the 2nd Defendant.

1st Defendant = Scammer
2nd Defendant = Bank where scammer account is held
Plaintiff = My father

Before anyone asks, I can reach out to the appointed lawyer in Hong Kong for clarifcation on this point, but given they charge just over 1000 AUD an hour, if I can at least fully clarify this point its just one less question I need to ask.

My interpretation is that the 1st Defendant is liable to pay my fathers legal costs. To what extent,its not clear.

Comments

  • +7

    This really shouldn't be something to ask online from random people, esp here, as it seems to have significant consequences. You can get a local lawyer for far less than that an hour to give you some advice on this and other things.

    Else you can try: https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/

    • This really shouldn't be something to ask online from random people

      What if a random person in a lawyer?

  • Read pages 9+

    https://www.hkreform.gov.hk/en/docs/rconditional_e.pdf

    Scammer is liable to pay your father's reasonable legal costs.

    • Thankyou for this information. Much appreciated

  • +4

    Scammer, but not bank pays not just legal costs, but costs of executing order. So the scammer would also be ordered to pay the banks costs.

    Before anyone asks, I can reach out to the appointed lawyer in Hong Kong for clarifcation on this point, but given they charge just over 1000 AUD an hour, if I can at least fully clarify this point its just one less question I need to ask.

    What would be funny is if you did engage the lawyer. There's a decent chance the scammer would also have to pay for that enquiry.

  • +2

    Before anyone asks, I can reach out to the appointed lawyer in Hong Kong for clarifcation on this point, but given they charge just over 1000 AUD an hour, if I can at least fully clarify this point its just one less question I need to ask.

    You need to reach out or you may get a very large shock when the Court awards costs that are just a small fraction of what you/your father has incurred.

    Taxed costs are entirely different than what appears on the bill your lawyer issues you.

  • +1

    I've read the scenario a few times and to me, it looks like the scammer here is the lawyer, am I missing something?

  • +1

    Key thing it is saying is that your father gets 'indemnity' costs paid. Basically there are two types of costs orders, one is on an 'ordinary' basis, the other is indemnity.

    I can't recall the exact differences, and it may vary between jurisdictions anyway, but indemnity is better and means more of the legal costs will be paid.

    It still won't be all of his costs, but should be a fair bit more.

    • 'indemnity' costs is the best type you can get meaning you can reclaim most reasonable costs.
      the other is 'ordinary' or 'party/party', you can only reclaim necessary costs

  • -1

    https://www.lawaccess.nsw.gov.au/

    LawAccess NSW is a free government telephone service that provides legal assistance for people who have a legal problem in NSW. They can provide you with information about your legal problem and contact details for services that might be able to assist you.

    • +1

      Why would the NSW entity provide assistance with a legal matter in Hong Kong?

  • but given they charge just over 1000 AUD an hour

    So just to clarify, we are dealing with two scammers ???

Login or Join to leave a comment