A report in The Times suggests that there may be a possibility of an out of court settlement in the potentially bitter legal dispute between Hull City and their former chairman, Paul Duffen. The real beneficiaries from a protracted legal dispute are often the lawyers who are fully entitled to be paid professional fees for the deployment of their expertise.
A report in The Times suggests that there may be a possibility of an out of court settlement in the potentially bitter legal dispute between Hull City and their former chairman, Paul Duffen. The real beneficiaries from a protracted legal dispute are often the lawyers who are fully entitled to be paid professional fees for the deployment of their expertise. A dispute of this kind could also damage the reputation of football as a whole and could serve as a distraction from Hull City’s battle to avoid relegation which has been given new hope by their 2-1 victory over Manchester City.
The legal proceedings launched by Hull alleged that Duffen ‘acted in breach of his employment contracts and fiduciary duties as a director through the use of company monies for his own personal expenditure and other wrongdoings.’ Duffen has always strongly denied the claims. One of the matters in dispute between the parties has been about payments to agents and payments from agents to a Guernsey-based service company, Reed Securities Limited which is registered in the British Virgin Islands on the former chairman’s behalf.
Whether there can be an out-of-court settlement and what form it would take must be a matter for discussion between the parties concerned. However, looking at it purely from a footballing perspective and also the boost that a Premiership club gives to Hull – a city that has faced economic challenges – it would be desirable if off the pitch issues of this kind could be settled through negotiation.