(LONDON, UK) – A High Court judge has ordered Mitch Winehouse to pay nearly £1 million to two friends of his late daughter, the singer Amy Winehouse, following a failed legal claim over the sale of her belongings.
Deputy High Court Judge Sarah Clarke KC ruled that Mr Winehouse must make interim payments of £569,330 (approximately $725,000 / €660,000 / £569,330 GBP) to former stylist Naomi Parry and £394,521 (approximately $502,000 / €457,000 / £394,521 GBP) to friend Catriona Gourlay within the next two weeks. He has also been instructed to cover the legal fees of both defendants on an indemnity basis. Ms Parry’s legal costs are estimated at £715,361 (approximately $911,000 / €829,000), while Ms Gourlay’s are put at £487,132 (approximately $620,000 / €565,000). Court records show Mr Winehouse spent roughly £950,000 (approximately $1.2 million / €1.1 million) on his own legal costs for the case.
The legal dispute centred on claims by Mr Winehouse that Ms Parry and Ms Gourlay had made money from selling Amy Winehouse’s items at auctions in the United States in 2021 and 2023. He argued they had “deliberately concealed” these sales and had no right to sell the property.
However, Judge Clarke had dismissed this claim in April, finding that Mr Winehouse “knew all along” about the planned sales and that neither woman had tried to hide them from him. In her judgment on Wednesday, she stated that Mr Winehouse had chosen to bring an “inherently weak claim” and pursued it “aggressively and relentlessly to the end”. She added that he had made “serious and unfounded allegations” against the defendants which had damaged their reputations, career prospects, financial security and health.
The judge also said that by pursuing his claim, Mr Winehouse had “deliberately turned this case into large-scale and expensive litigation” in a way that was meant to put commercial pressure on the defendants to settle on his terms. She noted that he had done this to “two young women who had stood faithfully by Amy, and also by him and his family”.