Warnell and Allenby and Anor

In the matter of *Warnell and Allenby and Anor*, heard before Judge Kari, the dispute concerned an interim hearing in family law proceedings. The mother sought to exclude a video recording of an altercation between herself and the father, which had been taken by the father's 14-year-old child. The father sought to admit this recording into evidence.

The central legal issues before the court were whether the video recording had been illegally obtained, whether the altercation constituted a "private conversation" for the purposes of evidence exclusion, and whether the probative value of the recording was outweighed by the potential prejudice it might cause.

Judge Kari reasoned that the recording was not illegally obtained, as the child was not acting as an agent of the father in making the recording. Furthermore, the court determined that the altercation was not a "private conversation" in the relevant sense, as it occurred in a common area of the family home and involved a physical altercation. The court found that the probative value of the recording, in shedding light on the dynamics of the relationship and the conduct of the parties, outweighed any potential prejudice.

Consequently, the court dismissed the mother's oral application to exclude the video recording. The father was ordered to file and serve an affidavit annexing a USB containing a copy of the recording within seven days. The proceedings were then listed for an interim hearing via Microsoft Teams on 16 September 2020.