Calls: Four abusive calls in 20 minutes
A law firm has been granted an injunction by the High Court after four female members of staff received anonymous, “obscene and criminal” phone calls.
Mrs Justice Hill said Foot Anstey argued there was a “strong case” that the calls were made by Dr Sean Stimson, who was involved in a dispute with the law firm over his aunt’s will.
She said it appeared that the calls made over 21 minutes on 1 August triggered the application for an injunction.
“In relation to one of the calls, the recipient’s note is to this effect: ‘I think he said he wanted to fuck and rape me, but I can’t remember how it was said.’”
One of the women, whose call contained “similarly abusive and sexually offensive language”, had transcribed “dozens” of Dr Stimson’s earlier voicemails and thought he was the caller.
The three others, who had not had “direct dealings” with him, listened to one of the voicemails and “to varying degrees said that they thought it was the same person who had called them”.
Dr Stimson’s aunt died in 2021, leaving her property under a will made in 2016 to three animal charities and a hospice, and making no provision for him.
Hill J said this led to a dispute between Dr Stimson and the south-west law firm, which was instructed by the beneficiary charities to administer the estate.
Dr Stimson argued that his aunt did not have capacity to make the will and made a separate will in 2020.
The judge said that, on the evidence before her, Dr Stimson had not “substantiated these assertions despite the fact that there has been lengthy communication with him” from the law firm inviting him to do so.
Along with the phone calls, the “themes” of Dr Stimson’s alleged conduct included threatening “attendance and confrontation” at the offices of the law firm and its charity clients.
He indicated in emails that he has purchased domain names in the name of the law firm and the hospice.
Since he “holds himself out as a director of computer services with a specialism in IT security”, these threats needed to be taken “very seriously”, along with threats to spread malware within the IT systems of the law firm and the charities.
Hill J described the draft injunction under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 as “carefully worded” and said there was no attempt to stop Dr Stimson communicating with the law firm “on a blanket basis, or indeed to stop him making appropriate reports to regulators and things of that nature as he sees fit”.
The draft injunction only sought to prevent “very clearly specified activities: attending in person at the premises save by prior agreement; organising or seeking to organise attendance by others in a similar way; communicating in a way that is abusive or threatening or otherwise involves harassment; engaging in computer misuse; adopting the use of or publishing any domain name that is likely to mislead”.
Dr Stimson would be able to “continue to engage in appropriate communication about the dispute over his aunt’s will provided the terms of the injunction are complied with”.
Granting the injunction, Hill J added: “This is not a disproportionate or heavy-handed approach.”
Foot Anstey was likely to succeed at trial in showing Dr Stimson was harassing people at the firm to influence its actions.
“In simple terms, the applicants are likely to prove that the respondent is trying to stop the execution of the will in a way that benefits others and not him,” Hill J said.
The hearing proceeded in Dr Stimson’s absence after the judge decided that he had deliberately not attended.
We reported yesterday on another ruling from Hill J in which she held that she did not have jurisdiction to grant an injunction to a company to stop a defendant from harassing its lawyers, saying the firm itself had to apply.
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