Former footballer hit with civil restraint order over litigation against firm

A retired Liverpool footballer has been made the subject of an extended civil restraint order after a High Court found his ongoing ‘creativity in pursuing’ litigation against international firm Charles Russell Speechlys goes ‘beyond the norm and…requires some intervention’.

Former Republic of Ireland international Steven Finnan brought a claim for breach of contract and/or negligence against his former solicitors in 2022. He alleged Charles Russell Speechlys had failed to advise him properly in relation to a dispute with his brother in 2016.

His claim was struck out in December 2023, and his appeal dismissed a year later. Permission to bring a second appeal was rejected in April 2025. A further application to reopen his intended appeal was refused in June 2025 and certified as totally without merit.

In Stephen John Finnan v Charles Russell Speechlys LLP, Mr Justice Adam Johnson said Finnan sought to make ‘essentially the same claim against Charles Russell Speechlys, although he has added an expanded description of a proposed case on causation and loss (together with certain other changes)’.

The judge struck out Finnan’s new claim. He found Finnan had not put forward a ‘properly coherent case on causation and loss’ in his original claim and his case had no merit.

’What Stephen seeks to do by means of his new claim is now to advance a more complete position on causation which not only could, but should, have been advanced before in his original action,’ he said.

The judge added: ‘To permit the new case to proceed would create the same practical effect as allowing an appeal against [the earlier order]. That seems to me a highly undesirable outcome, in circumstances where an attempted second appeal was rejected by the Court of Appeal not once but twice.

‘In my view it is a misuse of the court’s resources for a claimant to seek to achieve by a different route an outcome which he has already been denied under the process which was the proper means of redress for the wrong complained of. I conclude it amounts to an abuse and should be struck out on that basis.’

Considering whether to make an ECRO, the judge noted ‘a number of previous applications’ by the ex-footballer had been dismissed as totally without merit, though he was not persuaded the claim before him was totally without merit.

He described Finnan, who represented himself, as an ‘intelligent and determined person who is now fighting a rigorous rearguard action, and who had shown creativity in pursuing it’.

Ordering Finnan be made subject to an ECRO, the judge said: ‘The overall picture suggests a degree of compulsion in pursuing points repeatedly, which goes beyond the norm, and which requires some intervention.

‘That is so not only for the benefit of Charles Russell Speechlys, but is also in the public interest: the court has a responsibility to marshal its resources in a proper manner for the benefit of all court users, and to that end is justified in imposing an additional restraint on some litigants.’