The doctrine of res judicata

The doctrine of res judicata

A res judicata is a decision given by a judge or tribunal with jurisdiction over the cause of action and the parties, which disposes, with finality, of a matter decided so that it cannot be re-litigated by those bound by the judgment, except on appeal.

The purpose of the doctrine is to provide finality to litigation and to protect parties from being vexed by the same matter twice.

Final judgments by default or consent are included within this definition, but not decisions on procedural grounds and decisions which are not final in any sense.

Res judicata’ is most closely associated with the legal principle of 'cause of action estoppel' (see below), which operates to prevent a cause of action being raised or challenged by either party in subsequent proceedings where the cause of action in the later proceedings is identical to that in the earlier proceedings, the latter having been between the same parties (or their privies), and having involved the same subject matter. However, res judicata also embraces 'issue estoppel', a term that is used to describe a

To view the latest version of this document and thousands of others like it, sign-in with LexisNexis or register for a free trial.

Powered by Lexis+®
Latest Dispute Resolution News

Withholding DSAR documents from inspection during data protection proceedings by relying on a Data Protection Act 2018 exemption (Cole v Marlborough College)

Information Law analysis: This claim relates to the scope of production and the application of the exemptions to production of personal data in responding fully to a subject access request. The Claimant, Thomas Cole (Cole), who was a student at the Defendant school, Marlborough College (the College), submitted a data subject access request (DSAR) under Article 15 of the United Kingdom General Data Protection Regulation, Assimilated Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (the UK GDPR) after he was removed from the school following his involvement in a physical altercation with another student. In this half-day case management hearing, Mr Justice Nicklin assessed whether the College was entitled to withhold, in whole or part, documents containing Cole’s personal data, rather than providing the material for inspection ahead of a two-day trial on the data protection claim expected to start in mid-2025. The court held that the College was entitled to withhold some documents (containing Cole’s personal data) on the grounds of the exemption in paragraph 16 of Schedule 2, Part 3 to the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA 2018). In short, this exemption provides that a controller is not obliged to disclose information to a data subject where doing so involves disclosing information that relates to another individual who can be identified from that information, whether as the source of information or as the subject of such information. Written by Robyn Bond, associate at Ropes & Gray International LLP.

View Dispute Resolution by content type :

Popular documents