The Supreme Court has reserved judgement until next Tuesday in an appeal by ACC Bank against a decision by the High Court in August to allow Liam Carroll's Zoe group file a second application for examinership.
Michael Cush, SC for the Zoe group, said the second application had the support of 76% of the group's creditors, as well as the support of several unsecured sub-contractors whose submissions were referred to in court.
He said this was in keeping with the overriding purpose of the legislation for examinership.
He was questioned closely by the Chief Justice John Murray, as well as the other sitting judges, Ms Justice Sue Denham and Mr Justice Nial Fennelly over letters from a consultant relating to Liam Carroll's health and the affidavit of Zoe finance director, John Pope, in which he stated he had underestimated the medical position of Mr Carroll and the stress he was under.
Mr Pope stated he believed this had affected Mr Carroll's ability to make decisions.
Mr Justice John Murray said this was opinion, not evidence.
Earlier, Lyndon McCann, SC for ACC, characterised Zoe's second application as an 'abuse of process'.
He said the company had made a 'tactical' decision to withhold evidence from the first application, it had backfired and then it decided to 'have another go'.
He argued that a second application for examinership requires special circumstances, which was not the case with Zoe.
He said evidence that Mr Carroll's mental condition at the time could have impaired his decisions was 'scant indeed'.
