Supreme Court refuses to set aside judgment in long-running Bank of Ireland mortgage dispute

The Supreme Court has refused an application to set aside a judgment in a long-running dispute involving Bank of Ireland Mortgage Bank, a Donegal fisherman and mortgage documentation linked to a family home.

The case, Bank of Ireland Mortgage Bank U.C. v Murray, has already produced a series of High Court, Court of Appeal and Supreme Court judgments. The latest judgment was delivered by Chief Justice Donal O’Donnell on 13 May 2026.

The dispute concerned loan and security documents from 2003 and 2007. Mr Brian Murray maintained that signatures purporting to be his on the loan and security documents were not his and had not been authorised by him. The High Court had found that the bank had not proved that Mr Murray executed or authorised the relevant documentation.

That finding had important consequences. The charge on the family home was held to be void, including against Mrs Murray, because it had not been shown that Mr Murray had consented to the charge as required under the Family Home Protection Act 1976. However, the High Court also held that Mr Murray had received the benefit of the loan monies paid into a joint account and was liable in unjust enrichment for €132,355.63.

The Court of Appeal upheld the High Court’s decision, and the Supreme Court previously dismissed Mr Murray’s appeal. The latest application arose after it emerged that, shortly before the Supreme Court appeal was heard in December 2024, the bank had entered into a loan sale agreement involving transfer of the loan book through a structure leading to Pepper Finance Corporation.

Mr Murray argued that the bank’s failure to inform the Court about the transfer agreement amounted to an abuse of process and that the Supreme Court judgment should be set aside. He also pointed to correspondence from the bank and Pepper that appeared to treat the loan account and charge as still subsisting, despite earlier court findings that the bank had not proved execution of the documents by Mr Murray.

The Supreme Court was critical of aspects of the bank’s handling of the matter. Chief Justice O’Donnell said the bank’s conduct was “clumsily and worse” handled, and described its failure to inform the Court of the proposed transaction or its completion as both discourteous and imprudent. The judgment noted that the bank’s inconsistent position was unimpressive.

However, the Court held that this did not meet the high threshold required to set aside a final Supreme Court decision. The judgment emphasised that Supreme Court decisions are binding and conclusive under the Constitution, except in very exceptional cases involving a fundamental failure in the administration of justice.

The Court found that the underlying merits of the case were not affected by the transfer issue. The question remained whether Mr Murray had been unjustly enriched by receiving the benefit of the bank’s money. The previous courts had found that he had.

The judgment is important because it restates the principle of finality in litigation. Even where a party has handled a matter poorly, that does not automatically justify reopening a final Supreme Court decision. For a judgment to be set aside, the failure must go to the validity of the decision itself, not simply to procedural dissatisfaction or later-discovered complications.

The Court awarded the bank 50 percent of its appeal costs, despite the bank succeeding, because of the way aspects of the case had been handled. It also indicated that neither side should recover costs on the motion to set aside the judgment.

For borrowers, lenders and lawyers, the ruling is a reminder of the strict limits on reopening concluded Supreme Court litigation. For financial institutions, it also carries a warning: loan transfers and litigation positions must be handled clearly, consistently and transparently, especially where proceedings are still live before the courts.