The High Court will rule on Monday on an application by three members of the board of Blarney Woollen Mills Ltd for an order to prevent the removal of three directors. On Thursday, the court granted a temporary injunction to Mr Michael O'Gorman; his wife, Marian O'Gorman, who is chief executive of the company; and her sister, Ms Bernadette Kelleher Nolan, against Mr Patrick Kelleher, Mr Frank Kelleher and Mr Kevin Kelleher. The interim order prevented an extraordinary general meeting of the company, planned for yesterday, from going ahead.
Yesterday, Ms Justice Carroll heard an application for an interlocutory injunction by the same plaintiffs against the same defendants.
The plaintiffs want to prevent the defendants taking any steps to remove three existing directors - Mr Michael O'Gorman; Mr Jim Houlihan, financial director; and Mr Pascal Kelleher, chairman. They also want to stop the defendants taking any steps to exercise voting rights attached to certain disputed shares. The plaintiffs claim a concluded agreement was made on March 5th last for the sale of shares held by Mr Patrick Kelleher to Ms O'Gorman. This claim is denied by the defence.
The defendants yesterday gave an undertaking not to hold an extraordinary general meeting until Ms Justice Carroll gives her ruling on Monday.
Mr Dermot Gleeson SC, for the plaintiffs, said unhappy differences had arisen in a very successful company. The plaintiffs and defendants were all family members - sons and daughters of the founder of the company, Mr Christy Kelleher - or their spouses.
The difficulties manifest in the present proceedings had been running on and off for a couple of years. This was not the first time the parties had been in court. The intention in the interlocutory proceedings was to preserve the status quo and leave the longstanding directors in place until the matter could be fully tried. Ms Marie Whelan, for the defendants, said the plaintiffs were not entitled to an interlocutory injunction. There was no authority for the proposition that Mr Patrick Kelleher was not free to vote, as he saw fit, regarding his shares.
