Businessman John Magnier has lost a High Court case over the sale of the 750 acre Barne Estate in Co Tipperary.
The billionaire had claimed that he had reached a deal in August 2023 with owner Richard Thompson-Moore to buy the estate for €15 million.
In his judgment, Mr Justice Max Barrett ruled that he had "sought to hold the defendants to terms that on the evidence were never agreed, under contracts that were never made".
The judge said that neither the alleged land-sale agreement nor the alleged option agreement were concluded and there was no breach of an exclusivity agreement as claimed by Mr Magnier.
The case taken by Mr Magnier "does and must fail in its entirety," he added.
Mr Magnier wanted the High Court to enforce a deal he claimed he sealed with Mr Thomson-Moore with a €15m handshake agreement for the 751-acre Tipperary estate, on 22 August, 2023, at Mr Magnier's Coolmore home.
He sued Mr Thomson-Moore and Barne Estate Ltd over the collapse of the purchase and said the agreement he had reached was legally binding.
The estate had been owned by the Thomson-Moore family for generations and was held in a trust.
Mr Thompson Moore denied that any deal was agreed and after the lapse of an exclusivity agreement with Mr Magnier, a New York-based millionaire Maurice Regan offered €22.5 million for the estate.
The case lasted 19 days and is likely to run to millions of euro in legal costs which will be decided at a later date.
In his judgment, Mr Justice Barrett said Mr Magnier had claimed that oral agreements he reached with the owners of the estate were finalised and not merely discussed during a kitchen table meeting at Coolmore House, the home of Mr Magnier, on 22 August 2023.
He noted the defendants denied this and said that no binding agreement was reached. The judge found there was no oral contract reached and therefore no legally binding subsequent documentation.
Mr Justice Barret also found that the exclusivity agreement entered into nine days after the Coolmore meeting expressly contemplated that no binding sale agreement was in place.
The judge said the existence and terms of that document were "fundamentally at odds with the plaintiffs' theory that a concluded sale agreement had already been made".
Mr Justice Barrett said that all factual findings in his judgment were made on the balance of probabilities, "having assessed the credibility, reliability and consistency of each witness along with the contemporaneous documentary record".
He said he attached the greatest weight to contemporaneous documents generated before the onset of the dispute as these were the most reliable guide.
The judge also said that, in parts, the plaintiffs' accounts reflected a "progressive recasting of the facts" to suit their litigation position.
In essence, he said, the plaintiffs sought to hold the defendants to terms that on the evidence were never agreed, under contracts that were never made.
Mr Justice Barrett said the contemporaneous documents and objective conduct of the parties overwhelmingly supported the defendant's case that no binding agreement was made in August 2023 and that the plaintiffs' account of the meeting as presented in multiple interactions was inconsistent in ways that could not be attributed to minor lapses of recollection.
The judge will hear from both sides at a later date on the issue of costs.
In a statement, the plaintiffs said: "We took this case on principled grounds and though we have the utmost respect for the court we are disappointed that a deal which we believe was agreed over two years ago has not been upheld.
"We engaged in this process in good faith and wish all parties to this litigation well for the future.
"Pending full consideration of today's judgment, we will not be commenting further at this time."
