Far from a ‘soft crime’, lying in court really does have consequences as Christopher Filor & James Ramsden QC explain
- Quantum Tuning Ltd v White makes it clear that the courts are prepared to impose custodial sentences for a breach of a delivery up court order: by doing so, it sends out an important lesson on the consequences of telling lies.
As the famous Russian physicist Valery Legasov, who investigated the Chernobyl disaster, was quoted as saying: ‘Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth; sooner or later, that debt is paid.’
The defendant’s conduct in the recent High Court decision in Quantum Tuning Ltd v White (Rev 1) [2019] EWHC 1376 (QB), 169 NLJ 7844, [2019] All ER (D) 10 (Jun) exemplifies Legasov’s quote and, in the context of an ex parte court order where a penal notice is served upon a defendant, it really shines a light on whether the courts have the appetite for sending a contemnor to prison.
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