“… in breach of the duties pleaded in paragraphs 19 to 21 above, Dean Norman dishonestly used his control over the [Horton parties’] bank accounts and /or (direct or indirect) control over the accounts which transacted with them (including the accounts of the purported creditors) to operate a money laundering scheme by means of (among other things) the Account Payments, which were therefore not made pursuant to any legitimate loan transactions.2 2. The [Horton parties] adopt the definition of “money laundering” fromsection 340(11) of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 .”
“By reason of the aforesaid, [Dean]: 23B.1 concealed, disguised, converted and/or transferred property which he knew, alternatively suspected, constituted or represented a person’s benefit from criminal conduct, in whole or in part, directly or indirectly, and thereby committed an offence undersection 327 of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 . 23B.2 further or alternatively, entered into or became concerned in an arrangement which he knew, alternatively suspected, facilitated the acquisition, retention, use or control of property by or on behalf of another person which property he knew, alternatively suspected, constituted or represented a person’s benefit from criminal conduct, in whole or in part, directly or indirectly, and thereby committed an offence undersection 328 of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 . 23B.3 further or alternatively still, acquired, used or had possession of property which he knew, alternatively suspected, constituted or represented a person’s benefit from criminal conduct, in whole or in part, directly or indirectly, and thereby committed an offence undersection 329 of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 . 23B.4 otherwise, attempted, conspired, incited, aided, abetted, counselled or procured the commission of the offences set out in the preceding paragraphs.”
“In all the circumstances, it is inherently improbable that [Ivan] became involved in the money laundering scheme being operated by his son without knowing or suspecting that was the case.” involved in the money laundering scheme being operated by his son without knowing or suspecting that was the case.”
“In all the circumstances, it is inherently improbable that Mr Crump became involved in the money laundering scheme being operated by his business associate, said in paragraph 10 to be his “longstanding friend”, without knowing or realising that that was the case.”
“3.4— Power to strike out a statement of case (2) The court may strike out a statement of case if it appears to the court– (a) that the statement of case discloses no reasonable grounds for …defending the claim; (b) … (c) that there has been a failure to comply with a rule, practice direction or court order.” (a) that the statement of case discloses no reasonable grounds for …defending the claim; (b) … (c) that there has been a failure to comply with a rule, practice direction or court order.”
“The court may give summary judgment against a … defendant on the whole of a claim or on an issue if— (a) it considers that the party has no real prospect of succeeding on the …, defence or issue; and (b there is no other compelling reason why the case or issue should be disposed of at a trial.”
“The claimant must specifically set out the following matters in the particulars of claim where they wish to rely on them in support of the claim— (1) any allegation of fraud; (2) the fact of any illegality; (3) …; (4) ….; (5) notice or knowledge of a fact;”
“s.327 Concealing etc (1) A person commits an offence if he— (a) conceals criminal property; (b) disguises criminal property; (c) converts criminal property; (d) transfers criminal property; (e) removes criminal property from England and Wales or from Scotland or from Northern Ireland.” “s.328 Arrangements (1) A person commits an offence if he enters into or becomes concerned in an arrangement which he knows or suspects facilitates (by whatever means) the acquisition, retention, use or control of criminal property by or on behalf of another person.” “s.329 Acquisition, use and possession (1) A person commits an offence if he— (a) acquires criminal property; (b) uses criminal property; (c) has possession of criminal property.” (a) acquires criminal property; (b) uses criminal property; (c) has possession of criminal property.”
“48. Whether an adverse inference is appropriate will inevitably depend on the detailed circumstances of each individual case. But, in an appropriate case, it is clear that such an inference can properly be drawn from a failure to provide an explanation of apparently suspicious dealings and that doing so does not involve an inadvertent reversal of the burden of proof, which remains on SOCA throughout: see also Olupitan v. Director of the Assets Recovery Agency in the Court of Appeal[2008] EWCA Civ 104 at [30] and [31]. 49. Putting this in crude terms, and not forgetting SOCA's burden of proof, if a transaction looks like money laundering and has not been satisfactorily explained by a defendant who ought to be in a position to explain it if there is an innocent explanation, that is probably what it is.”
“3.— Admissibility of expert opinion and certain expressions of non-expert opinion. (1) Subject to any rules of court made in pursuance of this Act, where a person is called as a witness in any civil proceedings, his opinion on any relevant matter on which he is qualified to give expert evidence shall be admissible in evidence. … (3) In this section “relevant matter” includes an issue in the proceedings in question.”
“Expert evidence shall be restricted to what is reasonably required to resolve the proceedings.”
“expert evidence is admissible undersection 3 of the Civil Evidence Act 1972 in any case where the Court accepts that there exists a recognised expertise governed by recognised standards and rules of conduct capable of influencing the Court’s decision on any of the issues which it has to decide and the witness to be called satisfies the Court that he has a sufficient familiarity with and knowledge of the expertise in question to render his opinion potentially of value in resolving any of those issues.”
“the witness who is called upon to give evidence founded on a comparison of handwritings must be peritus; he must be skilled in doing; but we cannot say that he must have become peritus in the way of his business or any other business. The question is, is he peritus?”
“…whether the subject matter of the opinion is such that a person without instruction or experience in the area of knowledge or human experience would be able to form a sound judgment on the matter without the assistance of witnesses possessing special knowledge or experience in the area.”
“(a) The first question is whether, looking at each issue, it is necessary for there to be expert evidence before that issue can be resolved. If it is necessary, rather than merely helpful, it seems to me that it must be admitted. (b) If the evidence is not necessary, the second question is whether it would be of assistance to the court in resolving that issue. If it would be of assistance, but not necessary, then the court would be able to determine the issue without it (just as in Mitchell the court would have been able to resolve even the central issue without the expert evidence). (c) Since, under the scenario in (b) above, the court will be able to resolve the issue without the evidence, the third question is whether, in the context of the proceedings as a whole, expert evidence on that issue is reasonably required to resolve the proceedings. In that case, the sort of questions I have identified in paragraph 63 above will fall to be taken into account. In addition, in the present case, there is the complication that a particular piece of expert evidence may go to more than one pleaded issue, or evidence necessary for one issue may need only slight expansion to cover another issue where it would be of assistance but not necessary.”
“A judgment needs to be made in every case and, in making that judgment, it is relevant to consider whether, on the one hand, the evidence is necessary (in the sense that a decision cannot be made without it) or whether it is of very marginal relevance with the court being well able to decide the issue without it, in which case a balance has to be struck and the proportionality of its admission assessed. In striking that balance, the court should, in my judgment, be prepared to take into account disparate factors including the value of the claim, the effect of a judgment either way on the parties, who is to pay for the commissioning of the evidence on each side and the delay, if any, which the production of such evidence would entail (particularly delay which might result in the vacating of a trial date).”
“37 On or around31 January 2020 , Dean Norman met Nicholas Horton and Christine Horton at Select’s offices to discuss cashflow issues. During this meeting Nicholas Horton asked Dean Norman if he could personally raise funds to pay Select’s outstanding PAYE liability to HMRC. Dean Norman offered to use his and his wife’s savings which came from a recent pay-out from critical illness insurance policy for his wife’s cancer treatment, amounting to£75,000 , to lend to Select to pay some of the PAYE liability to HMRC. Nicholas Horton and Christine Horton accepted this offer on behalf of Select. Nicholas Horton asked Dean Norman to pay£75,000 to HMRC via the HFR bank account, because HMRC would not accept a payment from Select’s overdrawn bank account. 38. Dean Norman paid£75,000 to HMRC on behalf of HMRC on3 February 2020 .”
"Good morning Andy please see attached the letter from HMRC Dean has paid£75k today could the bank please assist with a further payment of£25k today we are expecting in£355k this week some on Thursday but mostly Friday I am so sorry to ask but obviously this is business critical and is in the cashflow for next week"
“I know the debt with [Mr Crump] mate I’m doing everything i can”
“When Dean first approached me about lending money to Select and the Partnership, he thought that he was set for great things with the Hortons, so I believed by making the loans I would be helping him out and earning a modest return on the money.” and in his witness statement dated18 April 2024 : “23. … When I entered into these loan arrangements, I never for a moment expected that I would have to sue to recover my money or that I would have to rely on any written loan agreement. My primary assurance as to repayment was that Dean was arranging the loans on behalf of someone he knew and trusted. … … 25. As regards the lack of any security, and as explained above, I never thought when I entered into these loans that I would need to take enforcement action to recover my money. I agreed to make the loans because I wanted to help my son and because I believed he would not have asked me to lend the money unless he thought it would be repaid. 26. Regarding the rate of interest, I explained in my first witness statement that the ultimate source of the money that I lent to the Partnership was BCP (see paragraph 10). For many years, whenever BCP had any surplus money, it paid that money into its savings account and over the years, that built up into a substantial sum (paragraph 8). 3.5 per cent per annum may not be a vast amount of interest but the money would otherwise have continued to sit in the savings account, earning bank interest at a low rate. From my point of view, these loans served the twin purposes of helping Dean and earning a slightly better rate of return. There were therefore perfectly legitimate reasons for the terms of the loans which had nothing to do with laundering money.”
“152. … Select was frequently overdrawn, in excess of its overdraft limit. This meant that, when Select needed to make payments but was in excess of its overdraft limit, it would have to borrow money. However, if it borrowed money and that money was paid into its own bank account, the money would be applied by the bank to reduce the overdraft down to its agreed level (£500,000 ). Payments therefore needed to be made circuitously, so that they did not pass through Select's bank account and that third parties (e.g. employees, suppliers, HMRC, etc) could be paid. 153. It is clear that the [Horton parties] were constantly firefighting, and this overdraft issue is also why there was a fluid cash-flow arrangement between the [Horton parties] (with money transfers between them, and payments to third parties by one Horton party on behalf of another Horton party) and why people other than the [Horton parties] would pay liabilities on behalf of the [Horton parties]”
“From timetotime Mr Norman (acting on behalf of the Defendants) and Mr Crump (acting on behalf of the Claimants) would orally (in person and by telephone) discuss and agree the terms for the repayment of the loans, and whether or not interest would be payable: 11.8.1. At the outset, they agreed that the initial Loans would be repaid by monthly instalments of principal and interest of£3,722 . 11.8.2. They later agreed that interest would not be payable so long as the sums advanced were repaid as soon as possible by the Defendants. 11.8.3. They later agreed that all Loans would be repaid by June 2020 and that interest would be payable at 3.5% per annum if they were not repaid in full by that date.”
“Dean talked about the Defendants' financial difficulties and how he felt it was his responsibility to find funding to help it through its liquidity issues. Dean is my best friend and I trusted (and trust) him completely; he needed help and I was in a position to help.”
“On their own, and pending further explanation from the parties, the existence of loans on these terms is not necessarily indicative of money laundering, although it may be one indication that the loans were part of a money laundering scheme. To determine whether the terms of a 'loan' give rise to suspicion when investigating suspected money laundering, all factors must be taken into consideration to give context.”