Speaking of well-written judgments, hats off to Deputy Master Linwood for working a classic 1970s rock lyric into a judgment on the winding up of a trust. His ruling in Henchley & Ors v Thompson & Anor – which had been running for eight years – begins: ‘The Eagles [pictured] in their iconic 1976 hit Hotel California said “You can check out any time you like but you can never leave”.’ Of course, the judge is not alone in imaginative scene-setting. Obiter has seen short history lessons and judicial flights of fancy that come straight out of Dickens. But the Eagles lyric – and the instant earworm that is Hotel California – is one of our favourites. We wonder what other lines from the song might surface: ‘We are all just prisoners here of our own device’ might be suited to one or two litigants in person we know.

Oh, if anyone is interested, the judgment approved an ‘updated account’ of the trust, which had been first settled 64 years ago. They stab it with their steely knives, but they just can’t kill the beast, as Glenn Frey might say.

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