The couple's High Court appeal backfired as a judge ruled they must pay even more in legal costs
A couple have been ordered to pay £150,000 in legal costs after a bitter 14-year neighbour feud over a garden ornament ended in court.
Philip New and wife Denise have been slapped with the hefty court bill after a "wretched" 14-year-long battle over a fence, an ornamental squirrel and a YouTuber's offensive songs about the man next door.
The couple ended up in court with their next door neighbours Steve and Karen Gibson after a disagreement about a fence between their Essex gardens in 2012.
The simple disagreement about a few inches of land escalated into an all-out war, with the Gibsons left devastated when the News removed a "sentimentally valuable" squirrel ornament from a post between the houses.
Mr Gibson was also shocked to learn that comedy songwriter Mr New had written and published on YouTube derogatory songs about him and about the battle between the two couples.
One song, titled 'Neighbours', purported to offer advice on how to deal with bad neighbours and included the words: "Throw shi*t at their window, sh*t at the door/ Call him a w****r, call her a w***e."
After a judge found against Mr and Mrs New at Southend County Court, they were last year ordered to pay the Gibsons £13,305 in combined damages and interest and handed lawyers' bills estimated at about £120,000 for the case.
However, they were back in court earlier this month after launching a High Court appeal against the damages amount.
They argued it was substantially too high and should be reduced, with the result that the costs bill should also be overturned.
Despite having the damages amount reduced by £700, the News have instead now been handed a further £19,000 bill for their neighbours' legal costs after a judge found the Gibsons were the winners of the case in "substance and reality".
Mr Justice Thompsell said the News' motivation for appealing had been to secure a big enough reduction in the damages to allow them to also avoid having to pay their neighbours' costs.
However, he said a £700 reduction did not justify overturning the six-figure bill they were already facing and ordered them to pay on top of that the Gibsons' near £19,000 costs of the appeal.
In the earlier judgment on the case at the county court, Judge Robert Duddridge described the "wretched" dispute as one which had "consumed" the neighbours' lives.
He continued, describing it was "unusually disproportionate, difficult and frustrating".
The judge said the two couples live in next door semi-detached properties in Sunnymede Close, Thundersley, Essex, with their gardens separated by a wooden fence.
Mr and Mrs New own and live next door in Sunnymede Close, where detached properties typically sell for about £400,000, having bought their house in 2006.
The dispute began in 2012 when Mr New replaced some fence panels, with the Gibsons complaining that it was in the wrong place and not in a straight line.
The couples agreed to settle their differences outside court, with the appointment of an independent surveyor to determine the line of the boundary in 2015.
However, Mr and Mrs New disagreed with the line chosen by the expert and had a second opinion by another, leading to the dispute escalating into a court battle when the Gibsons sued in 2018.
In 2021, the court ruled on the case, resulting in a declaration that the line chosen by the first surveyor had to be abided by and handing victory to Mr and Mrs Gibson.
He told the court of his upset when Mr New removed an ornamental squirrel from a post between the properties shortly after they lost an appeal in the case, before then removing the post itself with his hands and a mallet.
"According to his statement, the squirrel post had been built by his parents in law, he had purchased the squirrel as a gift for Mrs Gibson and her parents during the 1980s and, for that reason, it had enormous sentimental value," said the judge.
In November 2020, one of the Gibsons' children had discovered two songs, titled 'Neighbours' and 'Magic Garden', on YouTube and Facebook, said the judge.
"The song 'Magic Garden' describes somebody who uses walking sticks and purports to be in pain when out in public, but throws their sticks away and is miraculously pain free when in their garden and is committing benefits fraud.
"Mr Gibson described how upsetting, hurtful and hateful he found this song, which he thought was clearly about him, in view of his serious and rare disability and the difficulties he has had coming to terms with it," he said.
Giving judgment on the damages assessment, Judge Duddridge rejected the Gibsons' claim to have lost the use of a "substantial" part of their garden due to the News' trespass.
However, he also rejected Mr New's claim that his "tongue in cheek" songs, although "inspired" by his interactions with his neighbours, were not actually about them.
"I am satisfied that the songs 'Neighbours' and 'Magic Garden' were directly about the Gibsons," said the judge.
"As he ended up acknowledging, their content is offensive and defamatory. I accept that the claimants, in particular Mr Gibson, found the songs deeply hurtful and embarrassing given his rare condition, and that it aggravated the unpleasantness, emotional upset and mental health issues caused by this dispute."
He also rejected Mr and Mrs New's claim that they removed the squirrel and post because it was dangerous and said he was not convinced they genuinely thought the post was theirs until after their realisation that it was on their side of the boundary.
He said: "In my view, the true explanation for their actions is likely to be that they were angry at losing the appeal and decided to dismantle it in pique at their disappointment.
"In my judgment it was highly unreasonable for the defendants to remove the ornamental squirrel and the squirrel post at the time and in the manner they did."
Although the trespass by the News' fence was only by a "matter of inches" onto the wrong side of the line and affected a "trivial" amount of land, the Gibsons were "entitled to be compensated for the inconvenience and distress" they were caused.
They were awarded "aggravated damages" due to Mr and Mrs New's "high-handed, insulting or oppressive conduct".
The case reached the High Court in London earlier this month after Mr and Mrs New launched an appeal against the damages award they were ordered to pay.
Their barrister, Paul Wilmshurst, said the amount, because it exceeded the £3,000 they offered their neighbours as settlement prior to the trial, had resulted in them also being handed a "ruinous" bill for the Gibsons' lawyers' costs.
"While the overall award may be modest, its exact figure makes the difference, given the ruinous costs sought by and awarded to Mr and Mrs Gibson," he said.
Giving judgment, the judge ordered a £700 reduction in the overall amount to be paid on the basis that the lower judge may have wrongly awarded damages for a period after the end of 2021 when the Gibsons could have erected a new fence.
However, refusing to cut the award any further, he said: "I consider that the judge was entitled to assess compensation by reference to the squirrel post incidents and the scurrilous songs and that there is no reason to go behind his calculation of the appropriate award of damages in relation to these matters."
"The major motivation of this appeal for the appellants was to overturn the very substantial award of costs in favour of the respondents in the previous proceedings.
"The respondents have won as a matter of substance and reality."
The decision means Mr and Mrs New will have to pay their neighbours about £12,600 in damages, nearly £19,000 to cover their lawyers' bills for the appeal and also to foot the bill for the proceedings at the county court, estimated by the Gibsons' legal team at about £120,000.
