Background: The applicant was the deceased’s partner from at least 1995 and later his wife. The respondents are his children from a previous marriage. In a 1998 will, the deceased distributed assets among the applicant, the respondents, and his former wife. The will included a no-contest clause providing that a person who opposed the will or…
Held: The Supreme Court unanimously granted leave to appeal, allowed the appeal, and remanded to the Family Court. It held that an anti-claim no-contest clause—one directed at claims reducing the estate rather than challenges to the will’s validity—must be classified through interpretation of the will and the surrounding evidence. If the testator mistakenly treated property belonging to another person as part…
Background: Sheila Royles and Joseph Michael Johnson obtained costs orders against Maria Shalhoub after an earlier property-damage proceeding was dismissed. The assessed costs ultimately reached $452,007, with additional costs awarded after Shalhoub unsuccessfully sought leave to appeal. While the assessment was pending, Shalhoub transferred properties at 8 Helena Street, Randwick, and 25 Rainbow Street, Kingsford, to…
Held: Williams J held that the proceeding was a “special federal matter” under the Jurisdiction of Courts (Cross-vesting) Act 1987 (Cth). Although the claims seeking declarations that the pre-bankruptcy transfers were void arose under state law, the requested order transferring the properties to the bankruptcy trustee required determining whether the properties were after-acquired property divisible among creditors under ss 58 and…
Background: M. [N] [C] was placed under formal investigation for repeat drug offenses, money laundering, and criminal association. During questioning on June 2, 2025, the investigating judge reclassified the drug allegations as offenses involving the use of cryptographic technology, a criminal-level classification. M. [C] then sought annulment of several procedural documents.
Held: The Court of Cassation rejected the audiovisual-recording challenge. Under Article 116-1 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, the recording requirement applied only once the proceeding became criminal in nature through notification of the new classification. Because the investigating judge asked M. [C] no substantive questions after that notification, the investigating chamber properly declined to annul the interview.
Background: In June 2025, the Supreme Court of Mississippi announced its intention to adopt the NextGen Uniform Bar Exam, a new version of the Uniform Bar Examination.
Held: The court granted the Board’s petition after considering the requested implementation date.
Background: A tenant entered into a two-year lease beginning September 1, 2023, and prepaid 22 months of rent to the named lessors. The claimant purchased the leased property on January 16, 2024. It asserted that, upon the transfer of ownership, it succeeded to the rights and obligations arising from the lease and was therefore entitled to…
Held: The Regional Court of Appeal rejected the defendant’s jurisdictional argument. Because the claim, as pleaded, was not a rent dispute between parties to the same lease but a commercial claim seeking restitution of allegedly unjustly retained rent, the Commercial Court—not the Civil Court of Peace—was competent to hear it.
Background: Before Yemen’s current conflict, its Ministry of Oil and Minerals and the state-owned Yemen Oil & Gas Corporation entered into oil and gas exploitation and production-sharing agreements with DNO Yemen AS and other companies. After the companies withdrew from the agreements in 2015, the Ministry and YOGC commenced International Chamber of Commerce arbitration. A Paris…
Held: The CJEU held that paying funds to an unlisted public entity to enforce an arbitration award may amount to indirectly making funds available to listed persons even if those persons do not control or direct the entity. The prohibition can apply where they claim such authority and are actually capable of obtaining the funds. Recognition and enforcement of an arbitral…
Background: The Board of Trustees of the Alabama-West Florida Conference of the United Methodist Church and other petitioners sought a writ of prohibition against Perdido Bay Methodist Church and the other respondents.
Held: The First District Court of Appeal denied the petition for a writ of prohibition.
Background: In November 2021, the State indicted Dimitri Fedorov on charges including attempted murder, aggravated serious bodily injury, conspiracy to commit a felony, carrying a weapon, and assaulting a police officer. According to the twice-amended indictment, Fedorov decided to kill two men suspected of attacking him in July 2020. In one shooting, he allegedly fired five…
Held: President Yitzhak Amit granted the State’s application and extended Fedorov’s detention for 150 days beginning October 23, 2026, or until judgment in the underlying Tel Aviv–Jaffa District Court case, whichever occurs first. The Court held that the balance had not yet shifted in favor of electronic monitoring despite the extraordinary duration of the detention.
Background: Sebastian Papa held a Category AB firearms licence. In April 2026, police imposed special conditions concerning firearms at any location where his wife’s brother resided. When officers attended Mr Papa’s property to serve the conditions, he made abusive, argumentative and conspiratorial remarks about police, the firearms registry and government. He had also challenged police authority…
Held: Chen J dismissed the summons. Under the internal-review scheme, the review was a de novo merits review and the internal-review decision was the sole operative decision. The original revocation decision was therefore not independently amenable to judicial review.
Background: M. [T] [M] [V] was under judicial investigation for violence resulting in death without intent to cause death. The investigating chamber of the Nîmes Court of Appeal affirmed a liberty and detention judge’s order placing him in pretrial detention, and he appealed that ruling to the Court of Cassation.
Held: The Criminal Chamber held that the constitutional question was not sufficiently serious to warrant referral to the Constitutional Council. Although the challenged provision applied to the proceedings, had not previously been declared constitutional in the grounds and operative part of a Constitutional Council decision, and did not present a new constitutional issue, the statutory safeguards adequately protected the right to…
Background: A company later dissolved and transferred to the Treasury under Emergency Decree No. 670 entered into a 2015 advertising-services agreement with the defendants. In exchange for advertising services, the defendants undertook to transfer two units in an Istanbul development. The agreement provided for a penalty of TRY 1,000 per month if the transfer was not…
Held: The 45th Civil Chamber rejected the appeal on the merits and affirmed the dismissal. It characterized the monthly payment as a penalty cumulative with performance under Article 179(2): ordinarily, a creditor may demand both performance and the agreed penalty when an obligation is not performed at the specified time or place.
Background: In March 2022, the Council added Galina Evgenyevna Pumpyanskaya to the lists of persons subject to asset freezes and travel restrictions adopted in response to Russia’s actions against Ukraine. The Council identified her as the spouse of Dmitry Alexandrovich Pumpyanskiy, a listed leading Russian businessperson, and as chairwoman of the board of trustees of BF…
Held: The Court of Justice dismissed the appeal. It held that a family relationship alone is insufficient to establish association, but family members may be treated as associated when they share common interests that objectively go beyond the interests inherent in the family relationship. Those interests may take the form of a business relationship, even without a direct economic activity between…