ELOI KOFI MENSAH SIMMONS & ORS v. CATHERINE SIMMONS
2016
SUPREME COURT
GHANA
CORAM
- ANIN-YEBOAH JSC (PRESIDING)
- BAFFOE-BONNIE JSC
- AKAMBA JSC
- APPAU JSC
- PWAMANG, JSC
Areas of Law
- Family Law
- Civil Procedure
- Property and Real Estate Law
- Equity and Trusts
2016
SUPREME COURT
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
This Ghana Supreme Court appeal concerns a protracted marital property dispute between Catherine Simmons and her late husband, Eloi Kofi Mensah Simmons, arising from a divorce filed in 1994 and focused on the matrimonial home at Kwashieman, Accra. After the High Court dissolved the marriage and, years later, entered judgment largely by adopting parts of the parties competing settlement proposalswithout taking evidenceCatherine appealed. Eloi died during the appeal and his counsel substituted their adult children, Alice and Kofi. The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, referencing joint acquisition principles from Mensah v Mensah. On further appeal, Appau JSC, writing for a unanimous bench, held the High Court erred in foisting a non-consensual judgment based on without prejudice proposals and that the Court of Appeal should have set it aside. The Supreme Court allowed the appeal and remitted the case for retrial, admonishing counsel for intemperate litigation conduct.
APPAU, JSC. :
My Lords, the appeal before this Court is a simple marital property case arising from a divorce petition which, regrettably, celebrated its 21st birthday of its life in the courts on 19th December 2015. Its court age is therefore twenty-one (21) years, two (2) months and twenty-five (25) days as at today. The Petition was filed in the High Court on the 19th day of December 1994 by the man of the marriage; i.e. the husband.
The High Court delivered judgment in the case on 7th January 2008. The respondent (i.e. the wife) who is the appellant before us was not pleased at the way the trial court arrived at its decision. She consequently appealed against that decision to the Court of Appeal as was expected. However, almost two months after filing the notice of appeal, and before the parties could settle the conditions of appeal, the Petitioner/Respondent in the appeal (i.e. the man) died. He died on 22nd May 2010, (more than five years ago).
Considering the nature of the dispute which was on its journey to the Court of Appeal at the time of the Petitioner/Respondent’s demise, any reasonable mind would have thought that the dispute would die naturally since pursuing it would be tantamount to flogging a dead horse. Strangely enough, the case survived the dead petitioner with the two children of the marriage being dragged into the case as substituted petitioners/respondents to replace their dead father in his marital war against their mother (the appellant).
The appeal failed when the Court of Appeal dismissed it. Still dissatisfied, the respondent/appellant/appellant (hereinafter simply referred to as ‘appellant’), has come before us to re-consider her only ground of appeal, which appeared to be the same ground in substance in her first appeal before the Court of Appeal. I reproduce the two grounds below:
The only ground of appeal determined by the Court of Appeal was as follows; “The trial judge erred in law when he treated the proposals submitted without prejudice for consideration towards an amicable settlement as the basis for his judgment when there was disagreement on the said proposals”.
The ground of appeal before this Court after the first appeal suffered a setback is also as follows; “The Court of Appeal failed to pronounce on the paramount issue of whether or not the trial judge erred in law when he treated the proposals submitted without prejudice for consideration towards an amicable settlement as the basis for his judgment when t