Banker told court that land row upset his mother (but she had been dead 3 years)
A FORMER banker could face two years in jail for lying to a court that his mother was suffering ‘anxiety and distress’ over a boundary dispute – when she had in fact died years earlier.
Peter Bayliss, 63, was involved in a protracted court battle over a 12-inch strip of land between his 93-year- old mother’s cottage and that of her church warden neighbour.
But lawyers told a High Court judge yesterday that Bayliss had used his late mother Betty ‘as a shield’ in a plot to claim ownership over the right of way and so make more money from the sale of her £315,000 home.
Bayliss is accused of systematically lying to the court, which heard he had made remarks to lawyers about his moth-
‘The whole claim was fraudulent ’
er’s health and her care arrangements as recently as last year, long after her death in 2011.
He and his artist wife Kim, 54, had appeared on Mrs Bayliss’s behalf during proceedings relating to a dispute over land between her home in Westerham, Kent, and neighbour Sandra Saxton’s property.
Yesterday Philip Noble, representing Mrs Saxton, 70, told Mr Justice Blair that Mrs Bayliss had been included in the proceedings when she was in hospital in July 2011 and had died the following month.
But Bayliss had pretended she was still alive. He had mentioned to lawyers her emotional state and the ‘very nice care home’ she lived in, said Mr Noble. He added: ‘ He and his wife signed counterclaims and a defence in the name of his dead mother. They wrote countless letters offering to settle on her behalf. They came to court and gave evidence about Mrs Bayliss senior. There were false statements of truth that she was distressed by the proceedings. The whole of the claim was fraudulent and bogus... they lied from beginning to end.’
Mr Noble said that after losing the case Bayliss and his wife used the pretence that his mother was still alive to avoid an injunction banning the sale of her property, and then took the proceeds.
Mr Justice Blair granted Mrs Saxton permission to seek the couple’s committal to prison for contempt. That application will be made at a later date. The maximum penalty for contempt in civil court proceedings is two years in jail. Mr and Mrs Bayliss, who now live in King’s Lynn, Norfolk, were neither present nor represented at the hearing.
The former banker took over responsibility for his mother’s home in 2008 when she moved into a care home.
He and his wife quickly took issue with Mrs Saxton, a carer for the disabled, using the right of way as she had done for 20 years but lost a court battle over it in 2009. Last year Central London County Court heard the couple had then mounted a campaign of ‘visceral vilification’ to try to get Mrs Saxton removed from her property.
Judge Nigel Gerald was told they tried to get her sectioned by making false claims to police that she had mental health problems. Judge Gerald told them to pay damages and legal costs of £338,000 – more than the value of the property.