Judgment debtor

Abstract: The phenomenon of the judgment debtor evading the execution of legal documents and concealing his property by improper means has become increasingly prominent in China, which seriously affects the realization of the people’s legitimate rights and interests. To protect the legitimate rights and interests of the people, it is necessary to study the law enforcement possibility evaluation of judgment debtors and quickly judge which judgment debtor is likely to complete the legal documents. A novel hybrid TODIM (an acronym in Portuguese for Interative Multi-criteria Decision Making) method for evaluating the law enforcement possibility of judgment debtors is developed. The main idea of the hybrid TODIM method is to obtain the relative possibility value of judgment debtors by comparing the attribute values between two judgment debtors and aggregating all the attributes’ differences. The result shows that the hybrid TODIM method fully considers the psychological and behavioral factors of the law enforcement officers in the evaluation process. The evaluation result is more in line with the law enforcement officers’ experience in handling execution cases. Compared with the hybrid TOPSIS (technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution) method, the hybrid TODIM method is more suitable for solving the problem.

Abstract: The most important political priority of the European Commission in the recast of the Brussels I Regulation has been the abolition of exequatur. The policy to gradually abolish intermediate measures for the enforcement of judgments within the EU flows from the desire to enhance the free movement of judgments and the establishment of a genuine European area of justice. Whilst fundamental debate remained absent from the abolition of exequatur in several specific instruments, the abolition of exequatur including the grounds of refusal met with resistance during the negotiations on the recast of Brussels I. As a result of these negotiations, the new Brussels I Regulation — Brussels I-bis — will abolish the requirement to obtain a declaration of enforceability prior to enforcement, but will preserve the grounds of refusal at the enforcement stage. This article evaluates the discussions regarding the abolition of exequatur in the broad context of the EU regulatory and legislative framework, and analyses and assesses the new rules on cross-border enforcement in the Brussels I-bis Regulation. It seeks an answer to the questions (a) whether the new Regulation strikes the right balance between the premise of mutual trust and the need for national control over fundamental rights, (b) to what extent the new regime increases the rights of the judgment debtor while protecting those of the judgment creditor, and (c) whether the outcome of the Brussels I recast will or should have further repercussions for other instruments on cross-border enforcement.

Abstract: Most law enforcement cases executed by the courts in China have behaviours of evading, evading, or even violently resisting execution or passively waiting for enforcement, which seriously affects the authority of legal judgments and the judiciary’s credibility. Therefore, we develop a hidden property evaluation model based on the probabilistic linguistic three-way multiattribute decision-making (PL3W-MADM) method. Considering the advantages of probabilistic linguistic term sets (PLTSs) expressing the evaluation information and their probabilities on judgment debtor given by expert judges, we extend the three-way decision method to a probabilistic linguistic environment and develop the strict PL3W-MADM model and flexible PL3W-MADM model. Then, the PL3W-MADM models are used to construct the hidden property evaluation model of judgment debtors. Finally, the developed hidden property evaluation model can quickly and effectively classify the judgment debtors into three categories: hidden behaviour, no hidden behaviour or lack of information, and temporary inability to judge. The results show that the developed model is more suitable for hidden property evaluation than the strict PL3W-MADM model and the flexible PL3W-MADM model.

Abstract: Direct execution of a judgment debt against immovable property - including those burdened with mortgage bonds - is permissible in the high court on the condition that "where the property sought to be attached is the primary residence of the judgment debtor, no writ [of execution] shall be issued unless the court, having considered all the relevant circumstances, orders execution against such property." The amended rule is a result of section 26 of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996 and reflects the principle that was established earlier in Jaftha v Schoeman; Van Rooyen v Stoltz with regard to the magistrates' courts' execution process. The housing clause provides as follows: "(1) Everyone has the right to have access to adequate housing. (2) The state must take reasonable legislative and other measures, within its available resources, to achieve the progressive realisation of this right. (3) No one may be evicted from their home, or have their home demolished, without an order of court made after considering all the relevant circumstances. No legislation may permit arbitrary evictions." To give effect to debtors' rights under section 26(1), the constitutional court held in the Jaftha case that a clerk of the court may no longer grant judgments by default against primary residences. Rather, a magistrate must grant the order and may do so only after all the relevant circumstances have been considered. The case involved insignificant, unsecured debts that were enforced against vulnerable debtors' state-subsidised houses. It was therefore not immediately apparent that section 26 would apply also in the general context of mortgage bonds being enforced in the high courts.