Mark Solon follows a multi-billion pound law suit as it unfolds
There can be little better demonstration of the importance of delivering evidence well in court than the recent decision in Berezovsky v Abramovich [2012] EWHC 2463 (Comm), [2012] All ER (D) 116 (Sep).
Boris Berezovsky claimed that Chelsea FC manager Roman Abramovich, his former business partner, had intimidated him into selling shares in oil company Sibneft at a huge discount, with damages assessed to be in the region of £3.5bn.
But in her judgment at the end of August, Mrs Justice Gloster dismissed the claim, finding Berezovsky to be “an unimpressive, and inherently unreliable, witness, who regarded truth as a transitory, flexible concept, which could be moulded to suit his current purposes”.
She added: “I gained the impression that he was not necessarily being deliberately dishonest, but had deluded himself into believing his own version of events. On occasions he tried to avoid answering questions by making long and irrelevant speeches, or by professing to have forgotten facts which he had been happy to record in his pleadings or witness statements.”
Abramovich,
