An Irish businessman living in the Philippines tried to book an “owner's suite” with his wife at the four-star Tinakilly House Hotel in Wicklow, only to find that they were being offered exclusive use of the entire venue for their wedding, a Commercial Court case has revealed.
Gerald Lane, a resident of Essenza 21st Avenue, Manila BCG, claims that his business partner Dennis Connolly, who lives at the Tinakily House Hotel, has denied him access to his suite. He says he has never had a problem with them before and intended to stay “as usual.”
Lane said he was not informed in advance about the July 2022 wedding and that the overall tone of the interaction that day was “very aggressive.”
He says this was the beginning of the breakdown in their partnership, which they had built after meeting through friends in 2013.
The partnership bought hotels in Tinakilly and Cadiz, Spain, and Mr Connolly said they also had owner suites available for any time they wanted to stay there.
Lane is seeking several orders and declarations from the court, including dissolving the partnership.
On Monday Judge Michael Toomey agreed to put the case on the fast track commercial list following an application by senior counsel Declan McGrath, representing Mr Lane. He said that although Mr Connolly had not appeared in court, he had been in contact with him on a non-prejudicial basis and that he had agreed to the case being referred to the Commercial Court.
In his affidavit, Mr Lane said Tinakilly Hotel was purchased by the partnership from receivers in 2013 for €1.05 million, with an agreement that Mr Lane would own 49 per cent and Mr Connolly 51 per cent.
In 2017 he said he bought the boutique hotel Finca Monasterio in Cadiz for €2.5 million, with him owning 51 percent and Mr Connolly 49 percent. The hotels in Ireland and Spain are both popular wedding venues, with a total value of more than €12 million.
Mr Lane said he had donated an estimated €1.8 million to Tinakilly and more than €1.5 million to Finca Monasterio. Despite these large donations, he said he had not received any payments from the partnership to date.
He said he decided to “allow the tension between us to ease over time” after a disagreement on his arrival at Tinakilly in July 2022. However, in May 2023, he learned that the defendant had applied for a building permit for Tinakilly with a company called Greenhill Development (BC) Ltd, the hotel's legal owner.
This caused him significant concern and led to several emails from Mr Lane to Mr Connolly, but he said that in August 2023 he did not mention any concerns about the partnership, only the July 2022 disagreement.
In an email, Connolly accused Lane of “being incorrect in your assumptions” about the hotel being used exclusively for weddings and said his “nasty and bullying treatment of me and my colleagues was wrong.”
Mr Lane said he visited Ireland in November last year and met with Tinakilly's auditors and agreed to act as an intermediary.
The auditors later said that Mr Connolly wanted to resolve the impasse amicably. The auditors also made offers to buy out the other party's interests in both hotel businesses.
Lane's lawyers then contacted Connolly and also requested financial information about the hotel, but Connolly said he did not receive that information.
Mr Lane's lawyers issued a formal notice of dissolution of the partnership on 31 May, to which Mr Connolly responded denying the existence of a partnership.
In their application to the Commercial Court, Lane's lawyers said they were reserving their position on whether to file an injunction seeking financial information.
Judge Toomey urged the parties to consider mediation at this early stage.