Eddie Yeo Soon Chye

On the judicial record

A guide to how a High Court resolves commercial contract disputes and restitutionary claims — unjust enrichment, knowing receipt, constructive trust — and the procedural questions of costs, evidence and fair trial that shape their disposal.

Eddie Yeo Soon Chye sits in the High Court, and this collection is a commercial and civil list authored in English, with a strong contractual and restitutionary core. Contract disputes turn on the interpretation of a termination clause — whether a clause providing for mutual termination by notice permitted a unilateral termination — on the novation of a contract and section 63 of the Contracts Act 1950, and on a claim by the national electricity utility for arrears of electricity charges. Restitution and equity feature prominently through unjust enrichment and total failure of consideration, dishonest assistance, knowing receipt and constructive trust, and the illegality defence expressed as ex turpi causa. Civil procedure runs throughout: security for costs sought against a plaintiff said to be financially incapable, the burden of proof where a plaintiff fails to appear and the trial proceeds in its absence, an application to recall a witness and reopen a case under section 138(4) of the Evidence Act 1950, and a post-trial application to amend pleadings resisted as a tactical manoeuvre. Defamation appears in a matter engaging a protective order, in camera proceedings and restrictions on media publication to protect matrimonial privacy, invoking the court's inherent jurisdiction. Company questions arise over the locus standi of a dissolved or struck-off company to sue. The judgments identify the governing provision and apply it closely. Private individuals are referred to by role; corporate and institutional parties are named. A recurring theme is the interplay between contract and the restitutionary remedies that fill its gaps, and the careful control of procedure to ensure a fair trial even where a party is absent or seeks a late tactical advantage. The collection is a clear guide to how a High Court resolves commercial contract disputes, restitutionary claims and the procedural questions that shape their trial, and to the way equity supplies a remedy where the strict contract does not.