Hamish Scott Murphy v. Yoko Ishibashi

HCMP 494/2026

[2026] HKCFI 5431

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

MISCELLANEOUS PROCEEDINGS NO. 494 OF 2026

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J U D G M E N T

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A.  INTRODUCTION

1.On 27th March 2026, the Plaintiff (“Mr Murphy”) obtained an ex parte Mareva injunction (“the Injunction”) against the Defendant (“Ms Ishibashi”), restraining her from (inter alia) dealing with her assets in Hong Kong in the amount of JPY 892,080,000, in particular, funds in her HSBC account (“the HSBC Account”).

2.Mr Murphy subsequently issued an Originating Summons of 30th March 2026 and an inter partes summons of the same date (“the Continuation Summons”) seeking continuation of the injunctive relief. The Summons also sought disclosure of Ms Ishibashi’s assets. By a further summons of 31st March 2026, Mr Murphy sought disclosure in relation to the HSBC Account against HSBC pursuant to s.21 Evidence Ordinance, Cap.8 (“the Evidence Summons”).

B.  THE BACKGROUND

3.Mr Murphy and Ms Ishibashi were previously married. On 21st October 2021, Mr Murphy petitioned for divorce and financial relief against Ms Ishibashi in the Tokyo Family Court. On 1st April 2022, Ms Ishibashi filed a claim in the same court for damages against Mr Murphy for adultery. The two claims were consolidated and heard together.

4.On 28th January 2025, the Tokyo Family Court delivered its judgment (“the Japanese First Instance Judgment”). Mr Murphy’s claims were dismissed; he and his mistress were ordered to pay JPY 1m in damages to Ms Ishibashi, with a declaration of provisional enforcement.

5.On 26th March 2026, the Japanese High Court partially allowed Mr Murphy’s appeal, granting his petition for divorce; Ms Ishibashi was also ordered to pay JPY 891,580,000 to Mr Murphy by way of division of the family’s matrimonial assets, and an additional JPY 500,000 in damages for adultery (“the Japanese Appellate Judgment”). No declaration for provisional enforcement of the orders for payment was made.

6.It was on the next day that Mr Murphy sought and obtained the Injunction at a hearing before DHCJ Alan Kwong on an ex parte basis, saying that there was a real risk that Ms Ishibashi would dissipate her assets to evade enforcement of the Japanese Appellate Judgment.

7.On 8th April 2026, Ms Ishibashi filed an application for final appeal and a petition for acceptance of the final appeal with the Japanese High Court for a final appeal to the Japanese Supreme Court against the Japanese Appellate Judgment.

8.On 11th September 2026, the Supreme Court of Japan handed down an order, declining to accept the case for final appellate review and dismissing Ms Ishibashi’s appeal, on the grounds that the appeal did not come within the circumstances in which a final appeal could be entertained (“the Japanese Supreme Court Order”).

C.  THE CONTINUATION SUMMONS

C1.  The principles applicable to a s.21M HCO application

9.The Injunction was sought and obtained pursuant to s.21M High Court Ordinance, Cap.4 (“the HCO”), which confers the power the court to grant interim relief in relation to proceedings which (1) have been (or are to be) commenced in a place outside Hong Kong, and (2) are capable of giving rise to a judgment which may be enforced in Hong Kong under any ordinance or at common law.

10.There is no dispute that the applicable approach to s.21M HCO applications is that set out in Compania Sud Americana de Vapores SA v Hin-Pro International Logistics Ltd (2016) 19 HKCFAR 586 at [47] to [54] (Lord Phillips).

10.1  At the first stage, the starting point is consider whether the precondition under s.21M(1)(b) HCO is satisfied; in other words, whether the proceedings are capable of giving rise to a judgment which the Hong Kong court may enforce. If not, there can be no question of granting s.21M HCO relief.

10.2  The court should then ask itself the same questions as it would if a Mareva were sought in support of an action proceeding in the Hong Kong court, namely, (1) has the plaintiff a good arguable case before the foreign court, and (2) is there a real risk that the defendant will dissipate his assets if the Mareva is not granted.

10.3  At the second stage, the court needs to consider, as required by s.21M(4) HCO, whether the fact that the court has no jurisdiction apart from s.21M in relation to the subject matter of the proceedings concerned makes it unjust or inconvenient for the court to grant the application.

11.In the present case, the issues between the parties are:

11.1  whether the foreign proceedings are capable of giving rise to a judgment which the Hong Kong court may enforce, and whether Mr Murphy has a good arguable case;

11.2  whether there is a real risk of dissipation; and

11.3  even if the answers to the preceding issues are in Mr Murphy’s favour, the Injunction should nevertheless be discharged and not regranted by reason of material non-disclosure.

C1.  Whether proceedings capable of giving rise to a judgment which the Hong Kong court may enforce; whether good arguable case

12.The debate on this issue has been overtaken by events. Much of the dispute between the parties in their submissions and affirmations was directed at whether the Japanese Appellate Judgment was one which the Hong Kong court would enforce. Ms Ishibashi’s case was that it could not be enforced as under Japanese law, it was not final and conclusive; furthermore, Mr Murphy’s Japanese legal expert and Hong Kong lawyers had effectively conceded as much and Mr Murphy was guilty of material non-disclosure in suggesting otherwise.

13.I will return to the issue of material non-disclosure later.

14.On the question of whether the Japanese Appellate Judgment could be enforced, however, Ms Ishibashi’s arguments have effectively fallen away in light of the Japanese Supreme Court Order, which came to the parties’ attention shortly before the hearing. Counsel for Ms Ishibashi, Mr Tony HH Chow, had earlier submitted that until the appeal process was completely exhausted, the Japanese Appellate Judgment (and indeed the Japanese First Instance Judgment) remained non-final, non-binding, unenforceable, and did not constitute res judicata.[1]  However, the appeal process has indeed now been completely exhausted, and Mr Chow accepts that from the date of the Japanese Supreme Court Order, the Japanese Appellate Judgment is final and conclusive.

15.Given that there is a judgment debt owed by Ms Ishibashi under the Tokyo Appellate Judgment, which is now final and conclusive, the requirement for Mr Murphy to show a good arguable case has been satisfied: see Griffin Underwriting Ltd v Varouxakis [2021] EWHC 226 (Comm) at [33] (Calver J).

C2.  Whether real risk of dissipation

16.A plaintiff needs to show objectively, and holistically, that there is a solid basis for concluding that there is a real risk of unjustified dissipation of assets by the defendant. The evidence must be looked at holistically. Delay on the part of the plaintiff after the defendant has learnt of the claim against him may militate against the risk of dissipation, as the defendant would already have had the opportunity of disposing of his assets, should he have been minded to do so. See Convoy Collateral Ltd v Cho Kwai Chee & Others [2020] 6 HKC 81 at [53] to [54] (Lam VP, as he then was).

17.Furthermore, conduct which may be regarded as being of “low commercial morality” is not necessarily relevant to the risk of dissipation: China Medical Technologies, Inc and ors v Samson Tsang Tak Yung [2022] HKCA 41 at [38] (Chow JA).

18.Mr Murphy relies on three matters to say that there is a real risk of dissipation.[2]

18.1  That Ms Ishibashi’s claimed depletion of the funds in the HSBC Account is unfounded, the Japanese High Court having maintained that there was some JPY 1.38b in the HSBC Account as at 30th June 2018; and that the Japanese High Court criticised Ms Ishibashi not making disclosure in relation to the account. Ms Ishibashi’s undocumented assertion that only JPY 324m remained in the account as at 30th June 2018, together with her refusal to provide proof of the true balance in the account, showed that there was a real risk that she would not comply with the Japanese Appellate Judgment. Furthermore, the amount in the account had further been depleted to HK$126,854.71 as at 27th March 2026, and this was also unexplained.

18.2  That on 8th July 2018, a day after Mr Murphy notified Ms Ishibashi of his intention to seek a divorce, Ms Ishibashi forwarded two articles concerning asset dissipation and hiding assets in divorce from their joint email account to her own email address.

18.3  That Ms Ishibashi had a history of concealing assets, given that in 2012, she was subject to a tax audit and was ultimately assessed to be liable for JPY 76m in backdated tax.

19.I do not agree that these matters constitute a solid basis for concluding that there is a real risk of unjustified dissipation of assets by Ms Ishibashi.

C2.1  The HSBC Account

20.Mr Murphy’s main point relates to the funds in the HSBC Account. In essence, he says that Ms Ishibashi had substantial funds in the HSBC Account, which are now no longer in the account, and she has failed to credibly explain how she could have spent them, so that one can infer that she is dissipating or hiding her assets.

21.The amounts involved are as follows.

21.1  In the table of assets and liabilities, filed in the Japanese proceedings to set out the parties’ assets and liabilities for the purpose of ascertaining the matrimonial assets for division (“the Assets and Liabilities Table”), Mr Murphy had said that Ms Ishibashi had some JPY 1.38b in the HSBC Account as at 30th June 2018, whereas Ms Ishibashi said that she had only JPY 324m in the HSBC Account as at 12th January 2019.[3]

21.2  Pursuant to a court order in these proceedings on 17th April 2026, HSBC disclosed that the balance of the HSBC Account as at 27th March 2026 was HK$126,854.71.

22.Mr Murphy complains that Ms Ishibashi has not explained these depletions. He highlights that:

22.1  there has been no explanation of the reduction from JPY 1.38 as at 30th June 2018 to JPY 324m as at 12th January 2019;

22.2  the Japanese High Court had held in the Japanese Appellate Judgment that Ms Ishibashi’s depletion of the account was unfounded and that the court had held that there was JPY 1.38b in the account as at 30th June 2018;

22.3  there has been no explanation of the further reduction from JPY 324m as at 12th January 2019 to HK$126,854.71 as at 27th March 2026;

22.4  in the Japanese proceedings, the parties had been required to disclose their assets and jointly prepare the Assets and Liabilities Table, but “Despite this court-mandated obligation, [Ms Ishibashi] refused to provide full disclosure of her assets”; furthermore, “Her non-disclosure of the [HSBC Account] has been criticized by the High Court … [in the Japanese Appellate Judgment]”.[4]

23.It is necessary to understand how the parties’ assertions in the Japanese proceedings as to the balance in the HSBC Account at the time of their separation came about, and what the Japanese courts made of these figures.

23.1  The basis for Mr Murphy’s claim that there was some JPY 1.38b in the HSBC Account (to be exact, JPY 1,379,505,701) as at 30th June 2018 was that in Ms Ishibashi’s tax filing as at 31st December 2015, she had declared that very balance (of JPY 1,379,505,701) to be in the account. Mr Murphy also claimed that in June 2018, he had come across a bank statement for the HSBC Account showing a balance of just over JPY 1.3b, although he said that he did not keep the statement and therefore could not produce it. He therefore claimed, in the Japanese proceedings, that Ms Ishibashi had JPY 1,379,505,701 in the HSBC Account (in other words, that the balance had remained unchanged from December 2015).

23.2  Ms Ishibashi claimed that there was JPY 324m in the HSBC Account as at 12th January 2019. She did not put forward any bank statements to substantiate this. As Mr James Wood, counsel for Mr Murphy, now accepts, there was in fact no obligation on Ms Ishibashi to produce such statements (or other such documentary evidence of her assets) in the Japanese proceedings; since Mr Murphy had been the one seeking divorce and division of matrimonial assets, the burden of proof had been on him to prove the amounts claimed.

23.3  The Tokyo Family Court did not in fact grant any decree of divorce, so the figures were not used by that court for any asset division.

23.4  On appeal, Mr Murphy refiled the Assets and Liabilities Table. At the oral hearing of the appeal, Mr Murphy’s lawyer proposed minor mathematical updates and requested that the cut-off date for ascertaining Ms Ishibashi’s assets be changed to 30th June 2018, which Ms Ishibashi did not oppose. The Tokyo High Court ultimately adopted this date. In its judgment, the Tokyo High Court recorded that Ms Ishibashi did not actively dispute the amounts of the assets which Mr Murphy claimed were owned by her. The Tokyo High Court allowed Mr Murphy’s appeal and granted the decree of divorce. In dealing with the division of matrimonial assets, the Japanese High Court said that as Ms Ishibashi had not actively sought to disclose the status of her assets, there was insufficient evidence to accept her claims as to the amounts of her assets, and it was reasonable to conclude that she had the assets as claimed by Mr Murphy. The court proceeded to award a division of the matrimonial assets on the basis of the figures claimed by Mr Murphy.

24.The first point to note is that whether or not the HSBC Account did have JPY 1.38b as at 30th June 2018 is uncertain. Mr Murphy claimed that it did, but this was based on a 2015 tax return (which he produced in the Japanese proceedings) and a bank statement which he claimed to have seen dated June 2018 and stating about the same amount (but which he did not produce in the Japanese proceedings). Ms Ishibashi chose not to put forward evidence to refute it, as she was entitled to do. Her case was that there was JPY 324m in the HSBC Account as at 12th January 2019; when Mr Murphy sought to use 30th June 2018 as the date of separation, she thought that there would be no significant difference in using this date, so she did not object to it. She was not seeking to suggest that there had originally been JPY 1.38b in the account as at 30th June 2018 and that this subsequently fell to JPY 324m by 12th January 2019.

25.Thus whether or not there was a decrease from JPY 1.38b to JPY 324m in the space of a few months is not certain. Mr Wood submitted that if Ms Ishibashi had evidence to show that there was less than JPY 1.38b in the HSBC Account in June 2018, she would surely have adduced it, so as to reduce the amount which she would have been ordered to pay by the Japanese High Court by way of matrimonial asset division. However, Ms Ishibashi explained in her affirmations the personal reasons why she did not want to disclose her personal information to Mr Murphy. As counsel for Ms Ishibashi, Mr Tony HH Chow, submitted, if the risk of an adverse finding in the Japanese proceedings was the price to pay for her privacy, so be it, but it did not follow that Ms Ishibashi was dissipating her assets.

26.More importantly, however, no matter whether Ms Ishibashi had JPY 1.38b or JPY 324m in the HSBC Account in mid-2018 or early 2019, there is no reason why she should not have freely spent or moved these assets around at any time prior to the Injunction granted against her on 27th March 2026.

26.1  The Japanese First Instance Judgment of 28th January 2025 did not order Ms Ishibashi to make any payment to Mr Murphy, or injunct her from dealing with her assets. On the contrary, it was Mr Murphy who had been ordered to pay Ms Ishibashi damages for adultery.

26.2  It was not until the Japanese Appellate Judgment of 26th March 2026 that an order was made against Ms Ishibashi to make a payment to Mr Murphy. Even then, she was not prevented from dealing with her assets in any way – the court’s order did not restrain Ms Ishibashi from dealing with her assets, and, as Mr Chow pointed out, Mr Murphy had no proprietary claim to the funds in the HSBC Account.

26.3  Mr Wood submitted that it was unknown until the time of the Japanese Appellate Judgment of 26th March 2026 whether the Japanese High Court would treat the JPY 1.38b which Mr Murphy had claimed to be in the HSBC Account as at 30th June 2018 as part of the matrimonial assets; Ms Ishibashi had argued that it should not be so treated. As Mr Wood pointed out, had this amount not been included in the award, the amount which Ms Ishibashi would have been ordered to pay to Mr Murphy would have been far lower; indeed the view might reasonably have been taken that Ms Ishibashi’s assets in Japan would comfortably have covered the award. This is all the more reason why nothing sinister can be read into Ms Ishibashi’s movement of her overseas assets prior to 26th March 2026.

26.4  Indeed, at the hearing, in answer to the submission that if Ms Ishibashi’s dealing with her assets from 2015 (or 2018) to 2026 amounted to dissipation of assets, then Mr Murphy’s application for injunctive relief was very late, Mr Wood submitted that there was no basis for Mr Murphy to have applied until the Japanese Appellate Judgment was given on 26th March 2026, because “until that time, the Hong Kong assets [in the HSBC Account] were not in play, and the Defendant [Ms Ishibashi] could act with impunity, and there was only a remote possibility that the award [for division of matrimonial assets] would be determined by reference to those assets.”  As Mr Chow pointed out, if that was Mr Murphy’s view, Ms Ishibashi could hardly be criticised for taking the same view. Moving her assets around prior to the Japanese Appellate Judgment could not be considered to be unjustified dissipation of her assets.

27.The suggestion that Ms Ishibashi had wrongfully failed to give court-mandated disclosure in relation to the HSBC Account is incorrect.

27.1  Whilst Mr Murphy had sought discovery regarding some of Ms Ishibashi’s assets, he had not sought discovery regarding the HSBC Account. Furthermore, Ms Ishibashi had complied with the orders made by the court for discovery (which did not cover the HSBC Account).

27.2  Whilst the Japanese High Court accepted Mr Murphy’s submission as to what was in the account as at 30th June 2018 on the grounds that Ms Ishibashi had not actively sought to disclose her assets and that there was insufficient evidence to accept the figures she put forward – in other words, it found that Mr Murphy had discharged his burden of proof – there was no finding that Ms Ishibashi was in breach of any rules or orders relating to discovery.

28.Furthermore, Ms Ishibashi says, and Mr Murphy does not deny, that she made some voluntary disclosures regarding her assets, for example in preparing the Assets and Liabilities Table, which she had no legal obligation to do.

29.The fact that Mr Murphy does not know more about Ms Ishibashi’s assets and that she does not wish to disclose anything about them to him does not in itself point to any risk that she will unjustifiably dissipate her assets.

30.Mr Chow also pointed to the delay in Mr Murphy’s application. He submitted that if Mr Murphy considered that Ms Ishibashi’s conduct in spending or moving her funds in the HSBC Account since 2015 or 2018 was indicative of dissipation, he ought to have applied for injunctive relief earlier. I agree with Mr Chow that insofar as Mr Wood sought to counter this argument by submitting that Mr Murphy could not have applied prior to the Japanese Appellate Judgment because it was unknown whether the HSBC Account was “in play”, then on that stance, Ms Ishibashi’s conduct in spending or moving her funds in the HSBC Account could not be treated as indicative of a risk of dissipation.

C2.2  Forwarding of articles concerning asset dissipation and hiding assets in divorce

31.Ms Ishibashi did not accept that she forwarded articles about asset dissipation and hiding assets to her email address. The email was sent from the joint account of Mr Murphy and Ms Ishibashi. As she pointed out, if she had intended to hide assets from Mr Murphy, it seemed rather unlikely that she would have forwarded the articles from an account to which Mr Murphy had access; had she wanted to search for and retain the internet articles, she could have simply saved them on her own computer or bookmarked them (or indeed sent them to herself from her own account).

32.Furthermore, after Mr Murphy terminated Ms Ishibashi’s access to the account, the earlier email was forwarded from the joint account to Ms Ishibashi’s email address in December 2018, and to Mr Murphy’s lawyer and Mr Murphy’s mistress in April 2021. It is simply not possible to assume that any particular email sent from the joint account was sent by Ms Ishibashi.

C3.  Whether material non-disclosure

C3.1  The applicable principles

33.The duty of an applicant in an ex parte application is to make a full and fair disclosure of all material facts: Brink’s Mat Ltd v Elcombe [1988] 1 WLR 1350 at 1356F-G.

34.Material facts mean all those that are relevant to the weighing operation which the court has to make in deciding whether or not to grant the order. The correct test is not simply whether, if the non-disclosure had not occurred, the ex parte judge would, nevertheless have made an order, but whether the facts not disclosed, being relevant, should have been in the scales. See Citibank NA v Express Ship Management Services Ltd and another [1987] HKLR 1184 at 1190C-E (Fuad JA). The duty of disclosure applies not just to disclosure of facts “but to absolutely anything which the judge should consider”: Gee, Commercial Injunctions, 7th ed, paragraph 9-001.

35.The test as to materiality is an objective one, and it is not for the plaintiff or his advisers to decide the question; hence it is no excuse for the applicant to say that he was genuinely unaware, or did not believe, that the facts were relevant or important. See New Asia Energy Ltd v Concord Oil (Hong Kong) Ltd [2000] 2 HKC 681 at 685H-I (Keith JA).

36.The applicant must make proper inquiries before making the application: Brink’s Mat Ltd, citing Bank Mellat v Nikpour [1985] FSR 87. The duty of disclosure applies not only to material facts known to the applicant but also to any additional facts which he would have known if he had made such inquiries. What inquiries are necessary will depend on all the circumstances of the case.

37.Apart from material facts, a plaintiff must also identify any defences, which, although not yet taken, would have been available to be taken by the defendant had he been present at the ex parte application, provided that: (1) the defence is one which can reasonably be expected to be raised in due course by the defendant; and (2) the defence is not one which can be dismissed as being without substance or importance. See New Asia Energy Ltd at 686A-B.

38.I agree with Mr Chow that there was material non-disclosure on the part of Mr Murphy when he sought the Injunction at the ex parte hearing on 27th March 2026, in the following two respects.

C3.2  The Japanese Appellate Judgment was not final and conclusive at the time of the ex parte application for the Injunction

39.In support of the ex parte application for the Injunction, Mr Murphy had stated that his Japanese lawyer had advised that the Japanese Appellate Judgment was final and conclusive, and capable of being enforced in Hong Kong. The skeleton argument placed before DHCJ Alan Kwong stated that the Japanese Appellate Judgment was final and conclusive on its merits, and that in any event an appeal would not prevent it from being final and conclusive such that it could be enforced at common law.

40.However, DHCJ Alan Kwong was not told, or could not have known, that:

40.1  article 116 of the applicable Japanese Code of Civil Procedure (Act No.109 of 1996) provides that a judgment does not become final and binding until the expiration of the time frame specified for filing of an appeal with the court of second instance or a final appeal;

40.2  at the time of the ex parte application for the Injunction, the time for appealing against the Japanese Appellate Judgment had not expired, so that the judgment was not enforceable either in Japan or Hong Kong;

40.3  Mr Suzuki, the Japanese lawyer whom Mr Murphy said had advised that the Japanese Appellate Judgment was final and conclusive, and capable of being enforced in Hong Kong, would subsequently accept that the Japanese Appellate Judgment had in fact not yet acquired “formal” finality, that the pending appeal before the Supreme Court of Japan prevented the judgment from acquiring formal finality, and that he expressed no opinion as to whether it was “final and conclusive” for the purpose of Hong Kong law.

41.Mr Wood argued that the omissions were not material, since (1) it was not necessary for there to have been a final and conclusive judgment at the time of the ex parte application for the Injunction; all that s.21M HCO required was that the foreign proceedings should be capable of giving rise to a judgment which the Hong Kong court may enforce; (2) the fact that the Japanese Appellate Judgment was not final and conclusive would not have changed the judge’s mind as to whether or not to grant the Injunction.

42.However, it was surely relevant for DHCJ Alan Kwong to know that the Japanese Appellate Judgment, at the time of the ex parte application for the Injunction, was not final and conclusive and not enforceable in Hong Kong.

C3.3  Ms Ishibashi was not in breach of obligations to give discovery in the Japanese proceedings

43.In support of the ex parte application for the Injunction, Murphy 1st had stated that:

43.1  Ms Ishibashi “persistently refused to provide full disclosure and instead asserted that the funds [in the HSBC Account] had largely been spent”;

43.2  the parties were required to disclose their assets and jointly prepare an assets and liabilities table, and “Despite this court‑mandated obligation, Yoko refused to provide full disclosure of her assets. She sought to justify her non‑compliance on the basis of her assertion that the funds in the [HSBC Account] should be excluded from the matrimonial pot”;

43.3  “Given her lack of disclosure, I was placed in a difficult position and was unable to obtain any meaningful relief based on her representations”;

43.4  In the Japanese proceedings, Ms Ishibashi’s lawyer had submitted a breakdown of expenditure (in a preparatory brief) without any supporting disclosure to substantiate the expenditure;

43.5  the Japanese High Court “held that Yoko’s alleged depletion of the [HSBC Account] is unfounded and the High Court maintained that there is JPY 1,379,505,701 in the [HSBC Account] as at 30 June 2018. Her non-disclosure of the [HSBC Account has been criticized by the High Court at page 14-15 (under section 2) of the [Japanese Appellate Judgment]”.

44.These matters were repeated in Mr Wood’s skeleton at the ex parte application. They were relied on for the submission that there is a real risk that Ms Ishibashi would dissipate her assets.

45.In fact:

45.1  as Mr Murphy’s Japanese lawyer Mr Suzuki subsequently acknowledged, Ms Ishibashi was not obliged, as a matter of Japanese law, to disclose records relating to the HSBC Account;

45.2  nor was there any court order or requirement for Ms Ishibashi to give such disclosure;

45.3  Mr Murphy could have, but did not, apply for discovery against Ms Ishibashi in relation to the HSBC Account in the Japanese proceedings. To the extent that he did apply for discovery of Ms Ishibashi’s other assets in the Japanese proceedings, and that Ms Ishibashi was ordered to provide such discovery, she complied;

45.4  Ms Ishibashi had also provided voluntary disclosure about her assets;

45.5  Ms Ishibashi’s Japanese lawyer had filed several preparatory briefs which contained evidence supporting her expenditure;

45.6  the Japanese High Court found that there was insufficient evidence from Ms Ishibashi to substantiate her claims as to the amount in the HSBC Account, without using negative language such as “alleged depletion”, “unfounded”, or criticising. It said “…[Ms Ishibashi] has not actively sought to disclose the status of her assets, including the transaction history of the aforementioned bank account and the current balance, nor has she specified any specific amounts. Therefore, there is insufficient evidence to accept [Ms Ishibashi’s] claims, and it is reasonable to conclude that [Ms Ishibashi] possessed the assets as determined above at the aforementioned reference date.”

46.These matters were clearly material to the issue of whether there was a solid basis for concluding that Ms Ishibashi would dissipate her assets.

47.There has been no explanation as to why Murphy 1st was drafted in the way it was, particularly when Mr Suzuki had been acting for Mr Murphy in the Japanese proceedings and would therefore have been aware of (1) what applications Mr Murphy had made, and (2) what orders the court had made, in relation to discovery in those proceedings, and (3) what the requirements for discovery under Japanese law were.

48.Mr Wood did at least mention in his skeleton argument for the 17th April 2026 hearing (at which HSBC was ordered to disclose the balance of the HSBC Account as at 27th March 2026) that there was no obligation under Japanese law on Ms Ishibashi to give disclosure in relation to the HSBC Account. However, by that time, the Injunction had already been granted on an ex parte basis (on 27th March 2026) and continued on an inter partes basis pending full argument (on 2nd April 2026). The point was mentioned for the submission that the fact that Ms Ishibashi was not obliged to provide discovery under Japanese law did not preclude the Hong Kong court giving discovery against HSBC in Hong Kong. It was not suggested that it had any relevance to the continuation of the Injunction.

C3.4  Discharge for material non-disclosure

49.I discharge the Injunction on the additional ground of material non-disclosure.

C3.5  Postscript

50.On the eve of handing down this judgment, Mr Murphy’s solicitors wrote to the court on 22nd September 2026, saying that a number of matters were relevant to the issue of whether the Injunction should be continued, namely, that (1) they had just written to Ms Ishibashi’s solicitors asking whether they had instructions to accept service of a writ to enforce the Japanese Appellate Judgment, and had only received a holding response, (2) Mr Suzuki had just sent a demand to Ms Ishibashi’s Japanese lawyer asking for confirmation that she would make payment, but no response had yet been received, 21st to 23rd September 2026 being public holidays in Japan; and (3) Mr Murphy had just commenced proceedings in Hong Kong to enforce the Japanese Appellate Judgment in Hong Kong.

51.Assuming these matters all to be correctly stated, I do not consider that they affect my views as to whether a risk of dissipation has been shown, such as to justify the continuation of a Mareva injunction.

D.  THE EVIDENCE SUMMONS

52.In the light of my views above, this must be dismissed.

E.  DISPOSITION

53.I discharge the Injunction. I dismiss the Originating Summons, the Continuation Summons, and the Evidence Summons.

54.Given my view as to material non-disclosure, I further make a costs order nisi that Mr Murphy is to pay the costs of and occasioned by the Originating Summons, the Continuation Summons, and the Evidence Summons to Ms Ishibashi on an indemnity basis.

54.1  On an ex parte application, it is the applicant’s duty to present the application fairly. This applies with special force to applications for Mareva or Anton Piller relief, which by their nature are particularly liable to cause substantial prejudice to a defendant or other parties. See Gee at paragraphs 9-001, 9‑002.  

54.2  The fact that there has been material non-disclosure is plainly a relevant factor to be taken into account on the question of costs and is capable of justifying an award on this basis, and such an order will usually be made if the non-disclosure was deliberate or seriously culpable. See Gee at paragraph 24.048.

54.3  Mr Wood had submitted that the non-disclosures, if any, were not deliberate. However, heavy reliance was placed on Ms Ishibashi’s apparent non-compliance with obligations of discovery for the submission that there was a solid basis to conclude that Ms Ishibashi would dissipate her assets. Even if it was simply a case of carelessness that led to the true picture not being placed before the court on the ex parte application, this cannot provide an acceptable excuse for the non-disclosure.

54.4  This is particularly when Mr Murphy, in preparing his affidavit, had the benefit of being advised by Mr Suzuki, the very same Japanese lawyer who (1) subsequently acknowledged the correct position, and (2) had acted for Mr Murphy in the Japanese proceedings and would therefore have been aware of whether Ms Ishibashi was in breach of any court orders or other legal obligations for discovery in relation to the HSBC Account (or indeed whether Mr Murphy had ever applied for such an order for discovery in the first place). Indeed, the 1st Affirmation of Takahiro Suzuki says that he was engaged by Mr Murphy back in March 2021, acted as his legal representative in the Japanese divorce and property-division proceedings at first instance and on appeal, and had “direct knowledge of the conduct of those proceedings and of the written submissions and contemporaneous records referred to below”. This was therefore not a case of innocent disclosure in the sense that the facts were not known to Mr Murphy.

54.5  As mentioned above, there has been no explanation as to why Murphy 1st was nevertheless drafted in the way it was. Whilst the ex parte application was presented on an urgent basis, Mr Murphy’s team would have had ample time to prepare a potential application, stating the law and facts accurately, in anticipation of the Japanese High Court delivering judgment some time after the conclusion of the oral argument in January 2026.

55.The costs are to be assessed summarily on the papers. Ms Ishibashi has already lodged and served her statement of costs. Mr Murphy has leave to lodge and serve a list of objections, in bullet point form limited to two pages, within five days; Ms Ishibashi has leave to lodge and serve a reply, in bullet point form limited to two pages, within three days thereafter.

Mr James Wood, instructed by Hugill & Ip, for the Plaintiff

Mr Tony HH Chow, instructed by Andy Cheng Law Firm, for the Defendant