Ryan Sanders

Ryan’s experience includes advising:

• A business consultant on defending a Federal Court claim brought by the Rirratjingu people of Arnhem Land against various advisory parties and competing indigenous groups, alleging that they were misled when entering into a long term land-use agreement relating to mining activities, which culminated in a successful three-day mediation attended by over thirty lawyers and party representatives;
• A liquidator of NT Welding Pty Ltd in connection with unlawful phoenix activity, fraudulent transfers of funds and voidable transactions, including appearing as counsel to obtain Supreme Court freezing orders against various parties including a tax agent later sentenced to prison in connection with the matter;
• An indigenous landholding corporation in a successful Supreme Court action regarding the validity of a lease, dealing with complex issues of legislative interpretation under the Planning Act 1999 (NT);
• A remote healthcare provider in defending a Supreme Court claim for medical negligence with respect to the death of a young man who collapsed while midway through a football game, and prosecuting a cross-claim against the organisation’s insurer; and
• Voluntary administrators in the matter of Blackadder v McQuinn & Ors (No. 2) [2017] NTSC 57, in which the NT Supreme Court accepted the administrators’ contentions and recognised their rights to remuneration in circumstances where the company’s director was found to have invalidly appointed them. The judgment went further than all pre-existing Australian case law by confirming the extent of administrator’s rights to quantum meruit remuneration, and confirming that a lien arises at law to secure such remuneration.