Background
The plaintiff Di Wu applied to strike out the defendant Ke Yin’s defence and sought summary judgment. Wu alleged that Yin failed to exchange USD $600,000 for RMB Y3,966,000 as agreed. Wu obtained a judgment against Yin in a Chinese court for RMB Y3,510,015, which Yin refused to pay. Wu sued on two grounds: debt based on the Chinese judgment, and money had and received. Yin denied the allegations and claimed his bank accounts were frozen.
Legal Framework
The application was made under the Civil Procedure Act 2010 (Vic). For summary judgment, the court must be satisfied there is no real prospect of success for the defence. The defendant must provide sufficient evidence to show there is a question that ought to be tried.
Key Issues
Three main defences were considered: 1) Yin’s claim he did not know Wu, 2) Yin’s assertion his bank accounts were frozen, and 3) Yin’s argument that enforcing the Chinese judgment would be contrary to Australian public policy or natural justice.
Court’s Analysis
The court found Yin’s bare denial of knowing Wu was not supported by evidence. Bank statements showed Yin’s account was active when the transaction occurred, contradicting his claim of frozen accounts. The court deemed the bank records admissible as business records. Regarding the Chinese judgment, the court found no evidence of procedural unfairness or failure to follow Chinese law.
Conclusion
The court determined that Yin’s defences had no real prospect of success. Summary judgment was entered for Wu. The case demonstrates the high bar for successfully challenging foreign judgments in Australian courts and the importance of providing substantive evidence to support defences in summary judgment applications.
