The presence of royalty is never far from the England and Wales courts, where the lion and the unicorn on the royal coat of arms looms large over the head of the judge.
But Obiter cannot think of a day when no fewer than four separate royal families were involved in cases at the Royal Courts of Justice in London – all in the space of an hour on Thursday morning.
First up, fittingly, were the Windsors when Mr Justice Swift handed down a judgment in Prince Harry’s judicial review against the Home Office, in the case of Grandma (on the application of the Duke of Sussex) v Secretary of State for the Home Department.
Next came the Bourbons, as the former King of Spain Juan Carlos I lost an attempt to rely on state immunity in a claim brought by his former lover as he was no longer a ‘sovereign’ after his abdication. Ouch.
The former king’s argument that he was entitled to immunity ‘if accepted, would mean that if, tomorrow, the defendant were to walk into a jewellers’ shop in Hatton Garden and steal a diamond ring, he could face no civil or criminal proceedings’, Mr Justice Nicklin said. Now that would make a court case…
Finally, the long-running litigation between Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai, and his ex-wife Princess Haya Bint Al Hussein of Jordan seemed to finally come to an end when Sir Andrew McFarlane published his judgment concerning their children’s welfare.
Admittedly, no members of any of these families was physically present at the RCJ (so far as Obiter is aware) but the proceedings certainly felt more royal than usual.
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