Founder of the Bestival Rob da Bank won his 4-year-long court case – after he was originally sued for £650,000 for an allegedly unpaid loan.
The Island resident was appearing at Central London County Court accused of failing to repay a loan, made to him by TicketLine, to help save the ailing festival back in 2018.
The trial began in the middle of May and ran until the 25th May, with the verdict coming in on Friday (10th June).
Bestival – originally held at Robin Hill before moving to Dorset – has hosted some of the biggest names in the music industry such as; Elton John, Stevie Wonder and Duran Duran before it was moved to the Lulworth Estate in 2017.
1-yeat after its move though the event nearly didn’t go ahead, only saved when TicketLine came in at the last minute and saved the day.
TicketLine Network Ltd claimed it personally loaned da Bank and co-event director, John Hughes, about £1million to keep the event going, but he “refused” to pay back about £650,000 of it.
Da Bank – who’s real name is Robert Gorham – told the court he had never agreed to a personal loan believing that on those grounds he didn’t have to pay it back, also saying he wasn’t directly involved in the financial aspect of the venture.
After the court ruled in his favour last week, the 48-year old from Yarmouth said:
“Josie and I are so happy and relieved truth and justice have prevailed, and that four years of exhausting legal proceedings are behind us.
“We are so grateful to our incredibly loyal friends and families for keeping us going — and to our legal team of Russell, Sara and Jonathan, for proving our innocence beyond any doubt.
“We are now looking forward to getting back to what matters most to us — our kids and families, messing about with mates in fields and festivals, and launching our brand new Camp Bestival festival in August.”
Bit more to this than meets the eye ,,, no one lends , loans whatever you want to call it that sort of money and don’t want it back .
Even under a gentleman’s agreement ,handshake .
surely there was paperwork signed etc
Hopefully he doesn’t need any loans in the future
So he took a loan and didn’t think he needed to pay it back. How the hell does that work. Still he has a nice big house to live in.
Good for him banks are robbers
I agree, but Da Bank didn’t borrow from De bank. You can bank on that…