A MAN who tried to effectively bankrupt police forces in Scotland and Northern Ireland by suing them for more than £1 billion each has been told he will never be able to take such court actions again.
William John Morrow last year became the first person in the history of Northern Ireland’s justice system to be declared a “vexatious litigant” after he repeatedly tried to sue police forces and the Housing Executive in cases which judges described as “habitual and persistent”
Three judges in the High Court in Belfast have now refused Morrow’s appeal against the original finding, meaning that his career in court is over as he must seek the court’s permission before he takes any new legal action.
Morrow had made massive High Court claims for damages totalling more than £2.1bn between 2017 and 2012. Among those he had sued were Strathclyde Police, from whom he claimed damages of £1bn and £40 million for alleged malicious prosecution and false imprisonment in 1997/98 – to put that in context, Police Scotland’s annual budget is only slightly more at £1.1bn.
He sued the Law Society of Scotland for £500,000 over his divorce proceedings dating from 1993, and then added the Northern Ireland Housing Executive for good measure – he claimed £80m for his asthma worsening after the alleged allocation to him of an unsuitable flat.
The final case was against the Police Service of Northern Ireland from who he claimed damages of £1bn and £40m. In this case he alleged that the PSNI had recruited “verified criminals” and officers from Strathclyde Police into the police force ahead of “honest, decent, vastly experienced Royal Ulster Constabulary George Cross Medal officers.”
All four cases were struck out and costs were awarded against Morrow, and in 2014 he was declared a “vexatious litigant”.
The judge at the time, Master Bell said: “The right to bring a legal action where the civil law has been breached is a precious and important right.
“Every citizen deserves his day in court where he has a claim that genuinely requires determination. However, where completely unmeritorious litigation is brought, a plaintiff takes someone else’s day in court.
“Though the plaintiff has been unfailingly polite and courteous to both his legal opponents and to the court, each legal action has, in my view, been entirely without legal merit.”
He added that each set of proceedings has caused a considerable waste of public money in defending them.”
The latest judgement of the Belfast High Court was issued by Lord Justice Weir, sitting with Lord Chief Justice Morgan and Lord Justice Weatherup, who backed the previous finding that Morrow had “habitually and persistently” commenced vexatious proceedings without any reasonable grounds.
They held that Morrow, who represented himself in court, had made “the same baseless contentions repetitively until each case had been advanced as far as he could possibly make it go.”
Lord Justice Weir said: “The appellant has doggedly pursued each one of this series of hopeless cases with tiresome persistence to every judicial tier.”
He added: “His apparent lack of any insight might be thought unfortunate were it not for the harm which it has done and would, we are satisfied, if uncontrolled, be likely to continue to do both to those who are made defendants to his misguided and promiscuous litigation and to the orderly administration of justice.”
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