Case Nos: IL-2023-000080 and IL-2024-000038 - [2025] EWHC 2561 (Ch)

Fecha: 10-Oct-2025

Joint liability

Joint liability

186.

Mr Smith’s evidence was that he created the GetAddress Database personally. He is therefore personally liable for infringement of RMG’s database right and copyright. Codeberry is directly liable for the acts of marketing GetAddress insofar as it was done by Codeberry. The issue was whether Mr Smith was jointly liable for the acts of infringement by Codeberry.

187.

In Lifestyle Equities CV v Ahmed [2024] UKSC 17 the law on the joint liability of one party for a tort committed by another was set out by Lord Leggatt, with whom the remainder of their lordships agreed, at [102] to [137]. Accessory liability may arise either by one party knowingly procuring another to commit an actionable wrong or alternatively because the wrong is committed pursuant to a common design between the parties:

‘[135] To summarise, there is a general principle of the common law that a person who knowingly procures another person to commit an actionable wrong will be jointly liable with that other person for the wrong committed. The liability of the procurer is an accessory liability. Where the primary wrong is a breach of contract, this accessory liability takes the form of a distinct tort. Where the primary wrong is a tort, however, there is no need to posit a separate tort of procuring another person to commit a tort. Where the general principle applies, the procurer is made jointly liable for the tort committed by the primary wrongdoer.

[136] There is a further, distinct principle of accessory liability by which a person who assists another to commit a tort is made jointly liable for the tort committed by that person if the assistance is more than trivial and is given pursuant to a common design between the parties. On the facts of a particular case both principles may be engaged. But on the present state of the law assistance which falls short of procuring the primary wrongdoer to commit the tort cannot lead to liability unless it is given pursuant to a common design.

[137] Although procuring a tort and assisting another to commit a tort pursuant to a common design are distinct bases for imposing accessory liability, they must operate consistently with each other and such that the law of accessory liability in tort is coherent. Considerations of principle, authority and analogy with principles of accessory liability in other areas of private law all support the conclusion that knowledge of the essential features of the tort is necessary to justify imposing joint liability on someone who has not actually committed the tort. This is so even where, as in the case of infringement of intellectual property rights, the tort does not itself require such knowledge.’

188.

No person other than Mr Smith had any involvement in the acts of Codeberry with the exception of his wife. Mrs. Smith did no more than sign documents put in front of her without any knowledge of what they contained. The defendants formally admitted that the acts of Codeberry and those of Mr Smith in relation to Codeberry were one and the same.

189.

Mr Smith must have had knowledge of the essential features of the acts of infringement of database right complained of as carried out by Codeberry because he did them. For the same reason Mr Smith must have procured those acts. Mr Smith undoubtedly assisted Codeberry to conduct those acts since he carried them out himself. Although it is a little artificial to view a common design between Mr Smith and himself, it seems to me that nevertheless there was a common design between Mr Smith in his own right and Mr Smith as an officer of Codeberry. Mr Smith is jointly liable for Codeberry’s acts.