James v Yerkovich

The case of James v Yerkovich involved a dispute where a default judgment had been entered in favour of the plaintiff. The defendant, Ms Yerkovich, sought to have this judgment set aside on various grounds. The Supreme Court of Queensland was tasked with determining whether the default judgment should be upheld or set aside. The central issues were whether Ms Yerkovich had impaired capacity at the time of service, which would have necessitated a different service procedure under Rule 109 of the Uniform Civil Procedure Rules (UCPR), and if there were any other irregularities that impacted the entry of the default judgment.

The court examined several arguments presented by Ms Yerkovich. These included the claim that she had impaired capacity and thus should have been served under Rule 109 UCPR, which mandates special service provisions for persons with such impairments. Other grounds for irregularity included the relief granted in the judgment, which was not part of the relief claimed in the Statement of Claim, the lack of a proper certificate of service, deficiencies in the Statement of Claim itself, and the possibility that the action was statute-barred under the Limitation of Actions Act 1974 (Qld). The court also considered whether, in its discretion, the default judgment should be set aside under Rule 290 UCPR.

In ruling on these issues, the court referred to the case of Cusack v De Angelis, which emphasized that a defendant is entitled to have an irregularly entered judgment set aside. However, the court determined that none of the grounds presented by Ms Yerkovich warranted setting aside the default judgment. The court found that while there were procedural irregularities, they did not rise to the level of affecting the fundamental fairness of the judgment. Therefore, the application to set aside the judgment was dismissed.

The court scheduled a further hearing to address the issue of costs, to be held at 9:15am on Thursday, 15 February 2024.