Judge Richard Carter has dismissed Robert Stokes’s Stokes family financial lawsuit over about £850,000 he sent to Sebastian, ruling the money was a series of gifts rather than loans. The decision in the High Court in Leeds ends Robert Stokes’s attempt to recover payments tied to a house and a wedding.
Robert had said the transfers, made between 2020 and 2022, were loans. The judge rejected that claim after hearing the case in March, leaving Sebastian with the money at the centre of the dispute.
High Court in Leeds
The case turned on whether the payments created a debt or were simply family support. Judge Richard Carter found they were gifts, not repayable lending, and that is why Robert lost the claim.
Robert had bought Sebastian a house and funded his wedding. The total dispute reached about £850,000, a sum that included over £720,000 toward a £1m home and tens of thousands more for the ceremony.
Fernleigh Mount in the Dore
The home at the centre of the dispute was Fernleigh Mount in the Dore suburb of Sheffield. Sebastian and Olivia bought the six-bed detached stone-built property, with Robert paying most of the cost.
He also paid over £10,000 for flowers for Sebastian’s five-star wedding at Grantley Hall in North Yorks. Sebastian had been groomed to take over Stokes Tiles, and the family had hoped he would do so.
Robert Stokes and Sebastian
The judgment also pointed to the relationship between grandfather and grandson. Judge Richard Carter said it was quite possible Robert revisited his previous indulgence of Sebastian, while Sebastian’s position was that the money was gifts.
That leaves the practical position straightforward for the parties: Robert cannot use this ruling to recover the £850,000 he claimed, and the family dispute over those transfers is over unless another legal step is taken.
