Comments on: Truth and power http://stuartalexander.wordpress.com/2007/08/30/truth-and-power/ Rugby tournaments and sailboat racing Sat, 05 Jul 2008 17:17:50 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=MU By: Nick Carraway http://stuartalexander.wordpress.com/2007/08/30/truth-and-power/#comment-30 Nick Carraway Fri, 31 Aug 2007 07:23:02 +0000 http://stuartalexander.wordpress.com/2007/08/30/truth-and-power/#comment-30 If you want to predict how the court case might go, read the decision from the 1988 AC case, available at: http://www.nycourts.gov/history/cases/mercury_sandiego.htm Key point: to the extent the language of the Deed of Gift is unambiguous, the court will not look "beyond the four corners of the deed". So if they decide that the deed unambiguously requires the challenger to have held an annual regatta at the time of its challenge, then it seems to me that CNEV would not be a valid challenger. It won't matter whether Mercury Bay in 1987, SNG in 2003 or Desafio in 2007 were valid challengers. That is all "extrinsic evidence". And a further question on which the court can rule: did SNG breach its fiduciary responsibility to the beneficiaries of the trust (yacht clubs that meet the requirements of the deed) by self-dealing with a sham challenger? Over to you, Judge Cahn. If you want to predict how the court case might go, read the decision from the 1988 AC case, available at: http://www.nycourts.gov/history/cases/mercury_sandiego.htm

Key point: to the extent the language of the Deed of Gift is unambiguous, the court will not look “beyond the four corners of the deed”. So if they decide that the deed unambiguously requires the challenger to have held an annual regatta at the time of its challenge, then it seems to me that CNEV would not be a valid challenger. It won’t matter whether Mercury Bay in 1987, SNG in 2003 or Desafio in 2007 were valid challengers. That is all “extrinsic evidence”. And a further question on which the court can rule: did SNG breach its fiduciary responsibility to the beneficiaries of the trust (yacht clubs that meet the requirements of the deed) by self-dealing with a sham challenger? Over to you, Judge Cahn.

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