John Magnier, trail-blazing founder of world-leading Coolmore Stud, this week lost his high-profile High Court bid to enforce the alleged sale of the 751ac Barne Estate to him for €15m.

The bloodstock billionaire, whose business empire owns or controls more than 10,000ac of land in Co Tipperary and thousands more across the UK, Australia and the United States, failed to convince judge Max Barrett that an August 2023 handshake and verbal agreement reached with Richard Thomson-Moore and his wife Anna was a legally binding deal.

Mr Magnier, who was joined in his legal proceedings by his son John Paul (JP) and daughter Katherine Wachman, also failed to convince the court that he was given the option to buy shares in the company Barne Estate Ltd that owns the legal title to the property at Barne.

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A third allegation, that Richard Thomson-Moore and the Barne side broke the terms of an exclusivity agreement which would require them to deal only with the Coolmore side, also failed.

Mr Justice Max Barrett delivered a 74-page judgement on Monday, but paragraph two was enough to summarise the entire document. He wrote: “I am satisfied, for the reasons set out hereafter, that neither the alleged land-sale agreement nor the alleged option agreement were ever concluded. Nor do I see any breach of the exclusivity agreement to arise.”

Legal authority

The judge noted that neither Richard or Anna Thomson-Moore, nor auctioneer John Stokes had legal authority to commit Barne Estate Ltd to a sale on the night of 22 August 2023, nor claim to have authority.

The result is that John Magnier’s €15m alleged deal is erased, and the way is clear – for now – for Barne Estate to be sold to US construction mogul Maurice Regan, the man described during court proceedings by John Magnier’s legal team as a “dark force”.

During nine weeks of evidence, the court heard that Regan, who himself owns over 1,200ac of land in south Tipperary, repeatedly attempted to place bids on Barne Estate in August and September 2023, by contacting Richard Thomson-Moore, his sister Alexandra McCullough, their legal representatives and even their farm manager Colm O’Flaherty.

Regan, the court heard, was at first treated with some level of suspicion by the Barne Estate’s Jersey-based trustees but they ultimately accepted his €22.25m bid on 16 October 2023.

On 1 December 2023, Barne Estate Ltd and Mr Regan entered into a conditional contract for sale at €22.25m, subject to the High Court proceedings which concluded this week.

Whether John Magnier and his family will appeal Judge Barrett’s ruling is yet to be seen.

Responding to his judgment on Monday, they issued a statement saying they were disappointed with the outcome.

“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,” their statement read.

“We engaged in this process in good faith and wish all parties to this litigation well for the future,” they stated.

“Pending full consideration of today’s judgment, we will not be commenting further at this time.”