Case No. CR-2019-LDS-000669

407.I was not addressed on the question of whether the conclusions of Ms Stoneman were inadmissible hearsay. On any view however, it seems to me that they demonstrate that an independent person, experienced in the area, and who conducted a longer hearing on the matter with a great deal of material came to the conclusions that she did. It does not seem to me that it is possible to say that the claims brought against Charlie Pickering were baseless nor that they were not brought bona fide in the interests of the company but for the collateral purpose of preventing him reporting back to Lisa on alleged wrongdoing by the Relevant Respondents. The only relevant wrongdoing could be the alleged cash sales which I have found did not take place. That leaves wrongdoing in terms of alleged wrongful payment by the Companies of matters of personal expenditure etc. but there is no reason to think that Charlie had ready access to such information or that he in fact did report on such matters.408.On the more limited evidence available to me, I am satisfied that there were good grounds to dismiss Charlie Pickering and on the face of the evidence before me he was correctly dismissed. However, even if I am wrong about that, I agree with Mr Mundy’s submissions that any fault in this respect would at most be mismanagement not amounting to unfair prejudice. There was no right, even of a quasi-partnership nature, in Lisa to have her son employed. The only damage is said to have been one of the legal and settlement costs involved, which I suspect did not significantly affect the value of Lisa’s shareholding. In any event, even if I am wrong and there was unfair prejudice, the conduct in question is not such as I would have ordered a share buy-out as a result.