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A recent High Court decision has highlighted a number of issues relating to injunctions against "Persons Unknown", and specifically the fact that these orders have the potential to catch "newcomers" – people who did not fall within the defined category of “Persons Unknown” at the time the injunction was made but are subsequently brought within the definition (MBR Acres Ltd and others v McGivern [2022] EWHC 2072).
The judgment suggests some uncertainty as to whether newcomers can be bound by an injunction if they did not have actual subjective knowledge of it (with obvious ramifications for claimants serving such orders). It also queries how the courts should deal with the fact that newcomers automatically become parties to the substantive proceedings.
Jan O’Neill outlines these issues in a recent post published on Practical Law’s Dispute Resolution blog.
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