Court awards €46k for 'disappeared' Tory Island home

The High Court has awarded a film maker whose Co Donegal island holiday home "disappeared" while he was abroad €46,000.

Film maker Neville Presho, from Hollywood, Co Down, is also to receive the costs of his lengthy legal battle over the destruction of his house on Tory Island, off the coast of Donegal, Mr Justice Roderick Murphy ruled yesterday.

Last July, he won his High Court action against an adjoining hotel for trespass and physical damage to the 19th century stone house after it was gradually destroyed while he was living in New Zealand between 1988 and 1994.

Mr Justice Murphy found he was entitled to a new house or its equivalent market value. The case had been adjourned to allow lawyers for both sides make submissions on valuation after the court heard there were significant differences between the parties over what value could be put on an equivalent house in Tory.

Mr Presho's lawyer said their valuer had put it at €60,000 while counsel for the hotel owner, argued their valuer had put it at €11,000 to €12,000.

Today at the High Court Mr Justice Murphy said, based on figures presented to him, he worked out the correct valuation as €46,000 as well as his his legal costs. The judge granted a stay on his finding in the event of an appeal.

Mr Presho had sued Ostan Thoraigh Comhlacht Teoranta, and its owner Patrick Doohan claiming that after he returned home in 1994, he found a car park for the hotel in the place where his house once stood,

Mr Justice Murphy found that while Mr Presho was entitled to damages for trespass and interference with his property, it was not from the parking of cars on the house site, but from the use of a septic tank on the property for the hotel.