THE HIGH Court has heard a receiver appointed by Allied Irish Banks to operate a Co Monaghan convenience store and petrol station with a view to selling them may have no legal authority over parts of the shop and forecourt.
Mr Justice John Hedigan was asked yesterday to clarify an order made last June which banned former owners of Cloughvalley Stores, Carrickmacross, from being on the premises or interfering with the receiver’s running of the centre. They had refused to leave and occupied the centre following the receiver’s appointment.
George Brady SC, for Michael and Brigid Quinn, former owners of Cloughvalley Stores, told the court the couple were laying claim to private ownership of certain areas not contained in a guarantee for a €7.5 million bank debt on which the Quinns defaulted.
Mr Brady, for the Quinns, said the disputed areas had never been legally conveyed by the couple to their company and remained in their private ownership.
Mr Brady said Mr and Mrs Quinn were directors of Cloughvalley Stores Ltd and were seeking a declaration that their occupation of specific areas – in the store and on the forecourt – was not in breach of the ban imposed by Judge John MacMenamin in June.
The court heard the disputed areas constituted small pockets of the overall site of the centre, on the Castleblayney Road, Carrickmacross, which employed 50 workers including four members of Mr and Mrs Quinn’s family.
Judge Hedigan heard the take-over by the receiver, insolvency accountant Ken Fennell of Kavanagh Fennell, Dublin, had led to confrontations between members of the Quinn family, some of their workforce and customers and the receiver’s team. On two occasions gardaí had to be called.
Noirín Hassett, a chartered accountant with Kavanagh Fennell who was temporarily appointed to run the centre after Mr Fennell’s takeover, told the court in an affidavit she at one stage felt intimidated and feared for her safety during one of the confrontations, which was video-taped by a Quinn family member.
She said when Michael Quinn had been involved in an occupation of the premises with between 70 and 80 people in May last he had said he was putting her under citizen’s arrest.
Ciaran Lewis, for the receiver, told Judge Hedigan Mr Fennell had obtained an injunction from the High Court restraining Mr and Mrs Quinn from interfering with his running of the centre.
The court continues hearing legal argument today.