A settlement in the Coman family pub-and-drinks business dispute was made this week, but what led to the split, asks Christine Newman
Patrick Coman's ambition was to die having very little. So, in 1988, he and his wife, Mary, decided to give some shares in their pub business to their six sons, some of whom were still in school at the time. That left 52 per cent shared equally between the two parents.
It was a parental gift which proved to be the seed of a bitter family dispute, which ended up in court.
The case was described as a most tragic and unfortunate family dispute by a High Court judge as the two sides of the Coman family began their legal fight in February. Patrick and Mary Coman were refused an injunction in the preliminary stages of the court case.
Soon a picture of the turbulent years between the parents and five of their six sons - Geoffrey, John, Patrick junior, Thomas and Denis - began to emerge.
The Coman business was built up after Patrick and Mary Coman moved to Dublin from Tipperary in 1957. At the outset, they shared it 50/50.
Now the business involves Coman's Pub in Rathgar, Dublin, and a wholesale drinks distribution business. Their six sons have shareholdings of 8 per cent each in the companies, and are also directors.
The parents live in a house in Grosvenor Road, Rathgar, with a swimming pool and tennis court, said to be worth €3 million.
The court dispute revolved around an alleged agreement in February 2003 and this month the High Court was asked to resolve the meaning and effect of the meeting at which it was discussed.
The five sons claimed that the agreement involved their parents resigning immediately as directors of the companies and being paid €7 million for their shareholdings. The parents maintained that there was no concluded agreement and both sides gave different accounts of what occurred at the meeting.
The court was told at the time by counsel for the sons that the disputed agreement was secured because the parties wanted "a complete break" from each other "in business and, regrettably, in personal terms".
However, the dispute had been ongoing for many years before that and was steadily becoming more bitter before the culmination of the attempted February settlement.
Throughout the 1990s, relations between the parents and some of the daughters on one side and some of the sons on the other deteriorated.
Feelings became so bad at one stage that the parents made serious allegations against some of their sons and made formal complaints to gardaí. The feud involved not one single issue but a wide range of issues stretching back over a period of years, and it was always highly personalised.
According to David Larney, solicitor for Patrick Coman Ltd, the company which runs the business, Coman senior was drawing down money from the company in the mid-1990s. Larney told the court this month that the children were growing up at this stage and Coman senior was anxious to make provision for them. He started by making deposits on houses for the children and then began buying houses outright. As the amounts of money he was taking out got larger and larger, the difficulties of the company increased.
It was a dispute that Larney described as a "madness" that needed to be resolved. He said it became quite clear at virtually every board meeting that there was broad disagreement between the sons and the parents.
The evidence of 70-year-old Mary Coman in court this week gave a further insight into the depth of the family's personal dispute. She said relations with their sons began to deteriorate after one of her daughters was encouraged to buy a new property and sold her original house to one of the sons, Thomas. When the deposit on the new house was to be paid the company refused to give her daughter the cheque.
Mary Coman said this had occurred during a "terrible time" when her husband, now aged 80, whom she described as the most "generous, kind and caring of all fathers", was seriously ill and "on a drip" in Mount Carmel Hospital in 1994. She also said that none of her sons had visited her while she herself was in hospital on another occasion, which was "pretty shocking for a mother to realise". She wanted her sons to hear that "you don't do that to a mother".
When another daughter was to be married in 1997, "the shenanigans" started over again, Mary Coman told the court. There was the same problem about a cheque and the feud became more bitter, she said.
The dispute also concerned alleged financial advances made to Coman senior. Larney said that advances of some €1.25 million were made to Coman senior by the company. The way the advances were paid were always an "enormous issue" for the company; however, there was no objection in principle to the money being advanced, Larney said.
On November 6th, 1997, there was a resolution by the company that a request for money would be treated as an advance and that any subsequent advances would be treated in a similar way. The overwhelming majority of the advances took place after that date.
Larney said there had been correspondence as to how the advances to Coman senior were going to be treated. The company saw no objection to Coman senior getting the money but had a difficulty as to how the money would be lawfully treated, having regard to the Companies Act.
Patrick and Mary Coman were not present at the board meeting at which the resolution was passed. It was later put to them that if the money was not an advance against "bricks and mortar", what was it, he said. The question remained a "vexed" one on an ongoing basis.
Under the agreement, the sum of €1.25 million was being "forgiven" by the company. The effect would be that the "boys" would become the sole proprietors and owners of the company. The pub would be transferred to the company.
The two sides again tried to reach a settlement at the meeting on February 5th last year.
Neither of the family members from the two sides met during those legal negotiations. Some were in the Conrad Hotel, Earlsfort Terrace, and others in a nearby solicitor's office. Business was conducted through their lawyers and one, Brian O'Moore SC for the parents, described relations between the two sides in the families at the time as "atrocious". There were a number of matters outstanding at the time of the discussions in February 2003, issues that needed to be resolved if there was going to be a "clean break", he said.
On February 5th the legal teams were anxious to find out if there was a possibility of doing a deal. O'Moore said there had been discussions previously between himself and Gerard Hogan SC for the sons.
O'Moore referred to various offers made during the discussions on February 5th, 2003, which went on late into the night. He said he did a deal with Hogan encompassing seven or eight factors.
O'Moore said he was looking for a tax-efficient arrangement. It was clear that Hogan and himself agreed on 99 per cent of the issues.
Hogan was emphatic in court this week that there was a settlement that night. He was unequivocally and unwaveringly of the view that there had been a settlement. He left that meeting at about 11.15 p.m. and was absolutely satisfied there was a settlement, he said.
On the second day of the hearing, this month, Mr Justice Finnegan said it struck him as "bizarre" that "both parties were at the point of agreement and all of a sudden it was not going ahead". At the close of that day's hearing, , the judge indicated that if the parties "don't get some sense", there would be "nothing left for anyone" of the €7 million at the centre of the dispute.
It seems that sense did finally prevail. An out-of-court settlement was reached on Thursday evening and none of the family was in court when it was recorded.
It is believed the settlement is in the region of €7 million being paid to the parents for their shareholdings. But the human cost of the dispute can never be calculated.