New Zealand High Court 

Sentencing, murder, life imprisonment, MPI, reckless murderous intent  

R v Thompson [2026] NZHC 2943 (25 September 2026)  

T was sentenced after a jury found her guilty of murdering AT at a social gathering in Kaitaia – An argument developed between AT and his partner S, who was T’s friend – T smashed a beer bottle on a concrete step and stabbed AT twice in the neck - AT died shortly afterward – Jury rejected self-defence –  

HC found that AT was seated when he was stabbed and had not threatened anyone – T intervened because she objected to the way AT was speaking to S – Stabbing was sudden, impulsive, and not premeditated, but constituted an extreme and unwarranted overreaction to a verbal dispute – Fatal wound was inflicted by the second strike – Found T did not intend to kill AT; rather, she intended to cause injury, knew that the injury could well cause death, and consciously took that risk –   

Expert psychiatric evidence established that T had severe, chronic post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which made her hypervigilant to perceived threats, particularly from men – HC held PTSD, combined with alcohol consumption, affected her appraisal of the situation, emotional regulation, and impulse control – These matters explained, but did not excuse, her conduct –  

Offending was moderately aggravated by T’s deliberate creation of a lethal weapon, her use of it twice, and her targeting of the neck, a particularly vulnerable part of the body – HC did not find premeditation, and treated other suggested aggravating features as neutral or inherent in the offence of murder –  

Personal mitigating factors included T’s prior good character and absence of previous convictions, her PTSD and background trauma, her sincere remorse for the loss caused, and nearly 16 months spent on EM bail in a supportive rehabilitation facility – Her offending at age 29 was entirely out of character –  

Under the Sentencing Act 2002, life imprisonment was required unless manifestly unjust – Both parties accepted that life imprisonment was appropriate – An MPI of slightly below 11 years' imprisonment would otherwise have been warranted, but the statutory minimum was 10 years – Mitigating factors would readily have reduced the starting point to that minimum – T was sentenced to life imprisonment with a MPI of 10 years.  

New Zealand Immigration and Protection Tribunal  

Immigration, character, non-disclosure  

GF (2021 Resident Visa) v Chief Executive of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment [2026] NZIPT 207569 (31 August 2026)  

Unsuccessful appeal against decline of residence application – Kenyan citizen lived and worked in NZ for about 12 years as dairy farm worker and herd manager – Applied for residence under 2021 Resident Visa category – Returned to Kenya after mother’s death and subsequently charged with murder in connection with an intra-family dispute – Kenyan court prevented G from leaving Kenya while proceedings continued – G did not disclose charge to INZ, which later learned of it through Kenyan High Commission –  

INZ found G had withheld material information – Outstanding murder charge also created character impediment – Residence application deferred three times while awaiting outcome of criminal proceedings – After third deferral expired without proceedings being resolved, INZ declined character waiver and residence application – 

G argued second deferral was unreasonably short and INZ had effectively treated him as guilty despite presumption of innocence – Tribunal disagreed – INZ had appropriately exercised its discretion over the deferrals – Outstanding charge could constitute character impediment even though G had not been convicted – Character assessment did not amount to treating G as guilty –  

Tribunal accepted G otherwise had good character, including lengthy NZ employment and positive references from former employer – Also recognised significant financial and family difficulties arising from inability to return to NZ – Considered best interests of G’s younger child and interests of older child under s 188(1)(a) Immigration Act 2009, but found these did not require the grant of residence – G’s strong familial connections to Kenya and seriousness of unresolved charge also weighed against recommending an exception to applicable residence instructions – Appeal dismissed.  

United Kingdom Court of Appeal 

Conflict of laws, foreign judgments, res judicata, issue estoppel, intellectual property, applicable law  

Aviator LLC & Ors v Spribe OÜ [2026] EWCA Civ 1224 (2 October 2026)  

Appeal by A on what law applied to a plea of issue estoppel, based on a foreign judgment, in a case concerning claims for copyright infringement in intellectual property used for “crash games” allegedly committed in numerous territories – A claimed English law applied as the lex fori – Defendant S claimed the law applicable to each claim for copyright infringement, the lex loci protectionis, applied by virtue of the “Rome II Regulation” (the law applicable to non-contractual obligations) –  

A crash game is an online gambling game where players place bets on the outcome of a rapidly increasing multiplier – Goal is to cash out before the multiplier “crashes” down, which can happen at any random moment – Longer the player waits, the higher the potential reward; but if the player waits too long and the game “crashes”, the player will lose their bet – A claimed that S’s “Aviator” crash game infringed copyright in the Aviator Image and Aeroplane Device in the United Kingdom, Gibraltar and other Berne Convention countries – In earlier Georgian proceedings between related parties, A successfully challenged S’s Georgian trade mark on copyright grounds – A pleaded the Georgian decisions created issue estoppels precluding S from relitigating copyright subsistence, ownership and copying – Deputy Judge held that, for each foreign copyright claim, the existence and extent of any estoppel were governed by the law applicable to that claim under art 8(1) Rome II Regulation – A now appealed – 

CA held the applicable law was English law as the lex fori – Question was properly characterised as concerning the recognition and preclusive effect of a prior foreign judgment, not the substantive law governing liability for copyright infringement – Issue estoppel is a general rule controlling adjudication and duplicative litigation, irrespective of the underlying cause of action – Questions concerning the effect of foreign judgments fall within the law of the receiving court and outside Rome II’s regulation of non-contractual obligations – Rome II’s wording, scheme and relationship with the Brussels I regime supported that conclusion – If the matter were within the Regulation at all, it would fall within the exclusion for evidence and procedure in art 1(3), not within art 15 – It was therefore for English law to determine whether the Georgian decisions gave rise to the pleaded issue estoppels – Appeal allowed. 

Family law, child focused court model, child arrangements orders, domestic abuse

Re C [2026] EWCA Civ 1216 (29 September 2026) 

Substantially unsuccessful appeal against FC decision making final child arrangement orders for four children, following separation of parents in a relationship marked by domestic abuse –  

FC orders provided day-to-day care to mother (M) with limited supervised contact with father (F), discharged telephone contact, and refused M's applications to end direct contact, restrict F's parental responsibility, and make a non-molestation order – Judge also made order against both parents restricting further applications for 1 year – M appealed –  

First CA decision to consider FC's new Child Focused Court (CFC) model, an investigative, less adversarial procedure for determining private law children cases, introduced to improve outcomes for survivors of domestic abuse and better capture children's voices – Appeal raised questions about how judges should discharge their responsibility in cases under the new CFC procedure –   

CA found CFC model has changed procedure and culture but not substantive law; Welfare of the child remains paramount, and Practice Direction 12J FPR 2010, governing cases involving domestic abuse, continues to apply in full – Not every allegation of domestic abuse requires a fact-finding hearing, touchstone is whether findings of fact are "necessary" for assessing risk and determining welfare – Investigative character of CFC model does not diminish requirement of procedural fairness, and courts must continue to exercise robust case management while ensuring proceedings remain fair and proportionate – CA received submissions from Rights of Women as first intervener, and Cafcass England and Cafcass Cymru as second intervenor –    

Appeal dismissed on all grounds except order restricting M’s ability to make further applications – No sufficient basis for restricting M's future access to the court, since M's conduct did not fall within the categories of conduct meriting such an order, and it was wrong to equate her litigation conduct with that of F.  

United Kingdom Upper Tribunal 

Income tax, type of expense, flight crew, hotel accommodation

Commissioners for His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs v British Airways plc [2026] UKUT 00366 (TCC) 28 September 2026  

British Airways plc (BA) operated “back-to-back” transatlantic rotations under which cabin crew completed two linked return trips through London Heathrow Airport (LHR) – Between the trips, crew were required to spend a prescribed rest period in hotel accommodation near LHR supplied by BA – Following the introduction of European Aviation Safety Agency flight-time limitation requirements in 2016, use of that accommodation became mandatory, was incorporated into BA’s operational and contractual arrangements, and was monitored and enforced – The dispute concerned whether the accommodation constituted taxable employment earnings as argued by HMRC or was a deductible travel expense as argued by BA – Approximately £5.78M was at stake for the period 6 April 2016 to 5 April 2020 –  

First-tier Tribunal (FTT) allowed BA’s appeal, holding that the cost was deductible under s 337 Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003 (ITEPA), alternatively under ss 338 or 336 – HMRC appealed on five grounds, principally contending that the hotel stay was not undertaken in the performance of the crew’s employment duties, was not part of “travelling”, and was not “necessarily incurred” –  

HRMC appeal was dismissed – Tribunal determined that once rostered on a back-to-back rotation, cabin crew were required by their employment, BA’s operational scheme and the applicable regulatory framework to stay in the LHR accommodation – That obligation was intrinsic to the employment, not collateral, personal, social or merely preparatory – A back-to-back rotation was both the job and the journey: it began when the crew reported for the first flight and ended only when the linked rotation was complete – The interim LHR hotel stay did not end that journey – The accommodation expense was therefore necessarily incurred “on travelling” for the purposes of s 337 ITEPA – Once rostered, crew had no option but to undertake the rotation and use the prescribed accommodation so that the second trip could lawfully proceed after the shortened rest period – BA’s commercial choice to operate back-to-back rotations merely framed the duties of employment; it did not prevent the resulting expense from being necessary –  

HMRC’s appeal dismissed – Provision of the LHR hotel accommodation was matched by a deductible travel expense under s 337 ITEPA, so no income tax or Class 1A NIC liability arose in respect of that benefit.