Ready Rentals Ltd v Ahmed & Anor

Facts

Ready Rentals Limited, now in liquidation, brought proceedings in 2010 against Mr Kaamran Ahmed and Mr Aref Zakari concerning a property at 4-6 Victoria Terrace, Leamington Spa. On 28 March 2011 Judge Cooke, sitting as a Judge of the High Court, ordered Mr Ahmed to grant Ready Rentals a sub-lease and to pay its costs, subject to detailed assessment. A freezing order followed on 8 June 2011, and on 13 June Judge Cooke ordered Mr Ahmed to pay £90,000 held by his bank into Court, to be held pending detailed assessment, with £11,898.50 to be paid out forthwith to Ready Rentals' solicitors in respect of summarily assessed costs. After an email from a police officer, Judge Purle QC, sitting as a Judge of the High Court, ordered of his own initiative on 24 August 2011 that nothing be paid out without notice to West Midlands Police. Following more than three years of inactivity, Ready Rentals was wound up in January 2015, and in December 2015 it and Mr Ahmed agreed a consent order dividing the fund equally between them. When notice of that order was given, the Crown applied for a restraint order under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, alleging three frauds concerning 32 Bath Street, Leamington Spa. Both applications were listed before Newey J, sitting as a Judge of the High Court and of the Crown Court.