Million-dollar damages fail to deter motel owner’s dispute with law firm

Post-settlement, Gomes discovered significant defects, pest issues, and an unaddressed fire safety notice. Over time, the state of the motel worsened, and its operations were largely ceased.

In February 2025, the NSW Supreme Court dismissed all of Gomes’ claims against Sun Legal and the council, but did find the firm breached its duty of care to S&P Gomes as to building and pest reports, the terms of the contracts, and council inquiries.

Justice Richard Cavanagh accepted that Gomes would not have entered the property transaction but for this breach, but did not accept that the breach was responsible for Gomes’ psychiatric injuries.

Sun Legal was ordered to pay $1,216.615.17 in damages.

The court determined the council did not owe a duty of care.

Not long after the decision, Gomes and S&P Gomes filed a notice of appeal that contained 106 grounds, but this was knocked back by the registrar for being unsatisfactory. The appellants were given a deadline of June 2025 to file an amended notice of appeal.

VIEW ALL

When they did not comply with the order, Sun Legal and the council served notices of motion seeking to dismiss the notice of appeal.

Four days later, Gomes filed and served a notice of motion seeking leave for the appellants to be given eight weeks to file the notice. They failed on both motions before Justice Richard McHugh.

In his decision, Justice McHugh found there was no satisfactory explanation for the delay and both Sun Legal and the council were exposed to prejudice by reasons of that delay.

In their most recent application, Gomes and S&P Gomes sought to have Justice McHugh’s orders set aside and requested that the appeal be reinstated and that the time for filing be extended.

Justices Anthony Payne, Stephen Free, and Ian Harrison of the Court of Appeal dismissed the notice of motion with costs.

The bench said Gomes and S&P Gomes were mistaken to “take comfort” in Justice McHugh’s acknowledgement that one or some of the 106 grounds of appeal “may have been at least arguable”.

“That misunderstands what His Honour was saying: he was in fact doing no more than giving the appellants what may be described as the benefit of the doubt on the question of the possible strength or otherwise of the arguments they wished to propound in the appeal.

“His Honour was certainly not expressing a final view, favourably or otherwise, about the merits of these grounds,” Justice Payne said.

Gomes and S&P Gomes also misunderstood Justice McHugh’s reference to the prospect there was no reason to think they were any more likely to produce an amended notice of appeal.

Although they sought to characterise it as such, Justice Payne said this reference was not a prediction that they were “permanently incapable of rationalising their grounds”.

“His Honour was, as he was required, doing no more and no less than indicating his view of the then current state of affairs with which he was dealing,” Justice Payne said.

“The clearly desultory way in which the appellants had conducted the proceedings up until that time was a relevant consideration for him to take into account.”

Justice McHugh was also justified in dismissing the proceedings on the basis of whether the proceedings were “quick and cheap”, the Court of Appeal determined.

Citation: S&P Gomes Pty Ltd t/as Cohuna Hotel Motel v Mohan Sundar t/as Sun Legal [2026] NSWCA 85.