The "financial wizardry" of an insurance consultant who turned the "meagre nest-egg" of a 77-year-old woman into a veritable fortune was praised by a judge in the Circuit Civil Court yesterday.
Judge Liam Devally said that when Mary Angela Doherty approached the firm of M.G. Anderson Insurances Ltd, Park Chambers, St Stephen's Green, Dublin, in 1981, she was facing a bleak future with what she felt were inadequate funds to see her through the remainder of her life.
"Desmond Anderson and his company performed what can only be described as financial wizardry in changing the remaining 13 years of her life into happy, comfortable years by increasing her life savings of £11,000 into what eventually approached £150,000," Judge Devally said.
He awarded Mr Anderson and his company a £10,000 decree for fees and services rendered to Ms Doherty during those 13 years.
Judge Devally said he accepted that the secretive and eccentric Ms Doherty and the now 86-year-old Mr Anderson had agreed his company's fees should be deferred until after her death lest their deduction should dissipate her meagre funds.
He told Mr Brian Spierin, counsel for Mr Anderson (86), he accepted Ms Doherty had used his client and his company as confidant, adviser, messenger boy and nursemaid.
Ms Doherty, who died in 1992, had trusted him and had made constant demands on his firm and on his personal time and ingenuity.
Judge Devally told Mr David Heggarty, counsel for the executors of Ms Doherty's £85,000 will, that Mr Anderson, of St Martha's, Callery Road, Mount Merrion, Dublin, was due the £15,000 claimed in his action less £5,000 out-of-pocket expenses previously deducted.