Beautiful Virgin Islands

Thursday, Oct 30, 2025

CJ finds law firm breached confidentiality

CJ finds law firm breached confidentiality

One of Cayman’s leading law firms was found by the chief justice to have breached the confidentiality of one of its own clients to another in what was described as an “exceptionally complex cross-border case”. According to lawyers from Etienne Blake, who defended the various aggrieved parties, their information was given to another Walkers client, Dr Braga, who was a Brazilian court-appointed trustee in bankruptcy, that resulted in what was said to be “catastrophic consequences”.

In his ruling Chief Justice Anthony Smellie found that the case was marred by allegations of abuse and that Walkers lawyers, if not intentionally, breached their obligations of the attorney-client confidentiality, opening the doors for a $400 million claim against the local leading offshore law firm.

The case took more than a year to go through the courts, though it actually began some five years go and involved a number of parties, including two Brazilian bankers as well as Cayman-registered firms Arnage Holdings Ltd, Brooklands Holdings Ltd and East Farthing Holdings Ltd.

The chief justice dismissed claims by Walkers, the defendants, that despite a 25-year multi-generational relationship and invoices to the contrary, the plaintiffs were not their clients. CJ Smellie said in his ruling that “the Defendant (Walkers) should not have accepted the Dr Braga Retainer, as the defendant has itself come to belatedly acknowledge”.

He said that in acting for Braga against the plaintiffs, their other clients, Walkers breached its duties and obligations of trust, confidence and loyalty, which it owed to the plaintiffs.

“While I do not need to find and do not find that the Defendant acted knowingly and deliberately in breach, the breaches are nonetheless serious and clear,” the CJ wrote. “No explanation has been offered by the Defendant. There was, for instance, no explanation whatsoever why the managing partner who had direct responsibility for the then still ongoing August 2009 Retainer …decided that the Defendant could act for D. Braga when he was approached by Martin Kenney & Co to do so on 28 April 2010.”

The senior judge said there was no explanation from Walkers how it found itself acting for both these parties through the same litigation department, which was at the time made up of a compact team of just ten people. The court said this called into question Walkers’ due diligence and conflict-checking systems and procedures.

The case also considered a law firm’s disclosure obligations and the need for care and caution where a firm was aware that funding, in this case from the adverse party, was the product of a champertous relationship which is still an offence under Cayman Islands law.

Walkers had claimed that as any other competent attorney would have accepted the instructions, it should be absolved from liability. But the chief justice took a different view, stating it was an abuse of process. “No hypothetical reasonably competent attorney can be assumed to have been willing to act in an abuse of process of the Court, and certainly not without full and frank disclosure being made,” he said.

Anthony Akiwumi, who acted for the plaintiffs, said the decision was an “important professional liability judgment”.

He added, “The judgment is notable in that all of the Defendant’s defences on liability were rejected. In particular, the Honourable Chief Justice dismissed the Defendant’s proposition that despite a twenty-five year multi-generational legal services/private client relationship, the Plaintiffs were not clients of the firm.”

Meanwhile, it is understood that Walkers will be appealing the chief justice’s decision.

Newsletter

Related Articles

Beautiful Virgin Islands
0:00
0:00
Close
UK and Vietnam Sign Landmark Migration Deal to Fast-Track Returns of Irregular Arrivals
UK Drug-Pricing Overhaul Essential for Life-Sciences Ambition, Says GSK Chief
Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie Temporarily Leave the UK Amid Their Parents’ Royal Fallout
UK Weighs Early End to Oil and Gas Windfall Tax as Reeves Seeks Investment Commitments
UK Retail Inflation Slows as Shop Prices Fall for First Time Since Spring
Next Raises Full-Year Profit Guidance After Strong Third-Quarter Performance
Reform UK’s Lee Anderson Admits to 'Gaming' Benefits System While Advocating Crackdown
United States and South Korea Conclude Major Trade Accord Worth $350 Billion
Hurricane Melissa Strikes Cuba After Devastating Jamaica With Record Winds
Vice President Vance to Headline Turning Point USA Campus Event at Ole Miss
U.S. Targets Maritime Narco-Routes While Border Pressure to Mexico Remains Limited
Bill Gates at 70: “I Have a Real Fear of Artificial Intelligence – and Also Regret”
Elon Musk Unveils Grokipedia: An AI-Driven Alternative to Wikipedia
Saudi Arabia Unveils Vision for First-Ever "Sky Stadium" Suspended Over Desert Floor
Amazon Announces 14 000 Corporate Job Cuts as AI Investment Accelerates
UK Shop Prices Fall for First Time Since March, Food Leads the Decline
London Stock Exchange Group ADR (LNSTY) Earns Zacks Rank #1 Upgrade on Rising Earnings Outlook
Soap legend Tony Adams, long-time star of Crossroads, dies at 84
Rachel Reeves Signals Tax Increases Ahead of November Budget Amid £20-50 Billion Fiscal Gap
NatWest Past Gains of 314% Spotlight Opportunity — But Some Key Risks Remain
UK Launches ‘Golden Age’ of Nuclear with £38 Billion Sizewell C Approval
UK Announces £1.08 Billion Budget for Offshore Wind Auction to Boost 2030 Capacity
UK Seeks Steel Alliance with EU and US to Counter China’s Over-Capacity
UK Struggles to Balance China as Both Strategic Threat and Valued Trading Partner
Argentina’s Markets Surge as Milei’s Party Secures Major Win
British Journalist Sami Hamdi Detained by U.S. Authorities After Visa Revocation Amid Israel-Gaza Commentary
King Charles Unveils UK’s First LGBT+ Armed Forces Memorial at National Memorial Arboretum
At ninety-two and re-elected: Paul Biya secures eighth term in Cameroon amid unrest
Racist Incidents Against UK Nurses Surge by 55%
UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves Cites Shared Concerns With Trump Administration as Foundation for Early US-UK Trade Deal
Essentra plc: A Closer Look at a UK ‘Penny Stock’ Opportunity Amid Market Weakness
U.S. and China Near Deal to Avert Rare-Earth Export Controls Ahead of Trump-Xi Summit
Justin time: Justin Herbert Shields Madison Beer with Impressive Reflex at Lakers Game
Russia’s President Putin Declares Burevestnik Nuclear Cruise Missile Ready for Deployment
Giuffre’s Memoir Alleges Maxwell Claimed Sexual Act with Clooney
House Republicans Move to Strip NYC Mayoral Front-Runner Zohran Mamdani of U.S. Citizenship
Record-High Spoiled Ballots Signal Voter Discontent in Ireland’s 2025 Presidential Election
Philippines’ Taal Volcano Erupts Overnight with 2.4 km Ash Plume
Albania’s Virtual AI 'Minister' Diella Set to 'Birth' Eighty-Three Digital Assistants for MPs
Tesla Unveils Vision for Optimus V3 as ‘Biggest Product of All Time’, Including Surgical Capabilities
Francis Ford Coppola Auctions Luxury Watches After Self-Financed Film Flop
Convicted Sex Offender Mistakenly Freed by UK Prison Service Arrested in London
United States and China Begin Constructive Trade Negotiations Ahead of Trump–Xi Summit
U.S. Treasury Sanctions Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro over Drug-Trafficking Allegations
Miss USA Crowns Nebraska’s Audrey Eckert Amid Leadership Overhaul
‘I Am Not Done’: Kamala Harris Signals Possible 2028 White House Run
NBA Faces Integrity Crisis After Mass Arrests in Gambling Scandal
Swift Heist at the Louvre Sees Eight French Crown Jewels Stolen in Under Seven Minutes
U.S. Halts Trade Talks with Canada After Ontario Ad Using Reagan Voice Triggers Diplomatic Fallout
Microsoft AI CEO: ‘We’re making an AI that you can trust your kids to use’ — but can Microsoft rebuild its own trust before fixing the industry’s?
×