APC v Mr B (No 5)

[2025] NSWSC 308

Supreme Court

New South Wales

Medium Neutral Citation:

APC v Mr B (No 5) [2025] NSWSC 308

Hearing dates:

8 – 10 October 2024, 27 February 2025

Date of orders:

3 April 2025

Decision date:

03 April 2025

Jurisdiction:

Common Law

Before:

Schmidt AJ

Decision:

No further orders.

Catchwords:

DAMAGES –– historical child sexual abuse –– where plaintiff’s calculations revised after order for recalculation of damages for future care –– plaintiffs recalculations and proposed orders accepted including in relation to an application for a gross costs order and continuation of a freezing order –– where defendant’s submissions were not received until after judgment published –– where no different result would have been arrived at had submissions been received earlier –– found no need for Court to act of its own motion to set judgment aside –– no further orders

Legislation Cited:

Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 2005 (NSW)

Cases Cited:

APC v Mr B(No 2) [2024] NSWSC 1608

APC v Mr B (No. 3) [2025] NSWSC 142

APC v Mr B (No 4) [2025] NSWSC 273

Category:

Consequential orders

Parties:

APC (Plaintiff)
Mr B (Defendant)

Representation:

Counsel:
M Robinson SC / J McEnaney (Plaintiff)

Solicitors:
Shine Lawyers (Plaintiff)
Self-represented (Defendant)

File Number(s):

2022/302110

Publication restriction:

Nil

JUDGMENT

1. In December 2024 I gave judgment for APC, concluding that she had met the onus which fell upon her to prove her case that Mr B had repeatedly sexually abused her while she was a child: APC v Mr B(No 2) [2024] NSWSC 1608. In March 2025 I dealt with the damages and further orders which APC pursued, including as to costs, ordering her to recalculate her damages for future care in accordance with the conclusions which I had reached: APC v Mr B (No. 3) [2025] NSWSC 142.

2. On 26 March I made further orders, including as to damages, having considered the further submissions advanced for APC and given Mr B an opportunity to respond to them, which he did not avail himself of: APC v Mr B (No 4) [2025] NSWSC 273.

3. APC subsequently approached to advise that submissions advanced for Mr B had been served on her. It emerged that they had not been filed. Mr B had attempted to have them sent to my associate, but they had inadvertently been sent to an incorrect email address. That was apparently not noticed until after the 26 March judgment was read.

4. I was then supplied with those submissions, which:

• Rejected the calculation of damages and orders advanced for APC, without explanation, other than why Mr B considered that the evidence on which they had been based, which had been dealt with in the earlier judgments, was untrue;

• Explained his continued belief that APC and witnesses she had called had given various untrue evidence in their unlawful pursuit of money from him;

• Explained his opinions about APC’s true capacity and circumstances, which he sought to support by many photos of her which accompanied the submission. They depicted her in various situations at various times, including with other members of her family, but were not in evidence at trial;

• Explained his intention to appeal the judgments I had earlier given; and

• Explained the basis of his disagreement with conclusions which I had arrived at about certain evidence.

5. Mr B did not seek, but I am satisfied that the Court has, in these circumstances, power to set aside the judgment given on 26 March, acting of its own motion: r 36.15 of the Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 2005 (NSW).

6. That is a power which I would exercise if the submissions which went astray raised any matter relevant to what had to be decided in respect of the matters which had to be dealt with in APC v Mr B (No 4).

7. What there had to be resolved was whether the orders APC pressed, given the recalculation of her damages to reflect what had been decided in APC v Mr B (No 2) and APC v Mr B (No. 3), should be made.

8. It follows that what Mr B had sought to advance by his written submissions and the accompanying photos was thus not relevant to anything which had to be decided in APC v Mr B (No 4), given what they dealt with. Nor did Mr B’s submissions address APC’s recalculation of her damages, the submissions she advanced or the orders which she pressed, which was what the Court did have to deal with.

9. As a result, had I received Mr B’s submissions before I decided APC v Mr B (No 4), no different result could have been arrived at, he having advanced nothing of relevance to what then had to be decided.

10. In those circumstances I am satisfied that justice does not permit the exercise of the power to set that judgment aside, in order to take his submissions into account.

11. That the failure to provide those submissions to the Court within the extended time Mr B was given to advance his submissions was inadvertent, may be accepted. That was not challenged. But it was also not within the Court’s control. Given what Mr B wished to advance could have had no impact on the judgment which was given, there is simply no proper basis for the judgment now to be set aside.

12. In those circumstances it is unnecessary to make any further order, I having concluded that the Court should not act of its own motion to set the judgment which was given aside.

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Decision last updated: 03 April 2025