The High Court has found a “serious irregularity” in a Beth Din judgment that ruled in favour of a father against his son in a dispute over money.

Three years ago, the Golders Green Beth Din of the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations ordered Rabbi Saul Djanogly, a former director of London’s Sephardi Centre who now lives in Israel, to pay his father David £100,430.50 following a loan to set up a property business.

But the High Court overruled the rabbinic tribunal for failing to take account of whether the father’s original claim had been submitted too late to be valid under English law.

Under the 1996 Arbitration Act, a Beth Din is entitled to adjudicate in financial disputes if both parties agree to its role and is considered a far less expensive alternative to going to court.

But Rabbi Djanogly, disagreeing with the rabbinic tribunal’s verdict, appealed to the High Court.

According to the recently published decision of the the High Court, which said the dispute had a “very long history”, David Djanogly alleged that he had lent £125,000 to each of his two sons, David and Avi, in 1990 to start a property business called SAS. The company was wound up in 2010.

David “later came to allege that from about 1985 onwards he had lent about £610,000 to SAS itself and that Saul Djanogly, who assumed complete control of SAS from around 1992 onwards, wrongly contended that SAS had repaid David, when that was not the case,” the court said.

David, the court said, had historically been “relatively wealthy” but lost much of his wealth in the financial crash of 2007/8 and subsequently sought financial support from his sons.

Between 2007 and 2020, Saul had provided £170,000 in maintenance to his father but David contended he needed further support from Saul.

In 2013, David approached the then head of the Federation Beth Din, Dayan Yisroel Lichtenstein, who issued a ruling in 2016 that Saul should pay around £131,000 to his father and also £105,000 to his brother, finding that Avi had contributed more to his father’s upkeep than Saul. The dayan noted that this was a very sad case of a family that had allowed a dispute to grow into a “broiges”.

But Dayan Lichtenstein’s decision did not settle the row and in 2018 the Djanoglys agreed to the arbitration of the Golders Green Beth Din (GGBD).

In 2021, after nine hearings, David and his son Avi submitted a long document to the GGBD in which the father claimed that he had loaned £610,000 to SAS to buy properties.

Avi had repaid his father £125,000 from his personal funds, their submission said, which his father intended to return once he had received £610,000 from Saul.

According to the High Court’s summary, the claim “was predicated on the basis that Saul Djanolgy had misappropriated or wrongly used these monies in breach of the agreement whereby SAS was set up as a vehicle for property investment”.

However, Saul Djanogly rejected this account, having previously accused his father and brother of trying to “blacken my name”.

According to Saul, the SAS accounts in 2004 had shown that his father was no longer a creditor of the company. His father and brother’s claims against him did “not have any supporting written evidence”, he argued.

In March 2022, the GGBH made a final award, deciding Saul was liable to pay just over £100,000 to his father.

The Beth Din was still to decide on Avi’s claim against his brother and Saul’s counterclaims against his father and brother.

Although Mr Justice Miles, sitting in the Chancery division of the High Court, rejected some of the legal challenges made by Rabbi Djanogly against the Beth Din, he found that the rabbinic tribunal should have considered his defence that the father’s claim had been made too late.

Under the 1980 Limitation Act, a claim would normally have to be brought within six years of the relevant events.

While Rabbi Djanogly had raised the limitation defence, “there was nothing to suggest that the tribunal considered it,” Mr Justice Miles decided.

“The next question is whether this failure has caused a substantial injustice to Saul Djanogly,” the judge said. “I am satisfied that had the tribunal adopted a different means and addressed the limitation defence, they might have might well have reached a conclusion favourable to Saul Djanogly.”