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The High Court has ruled a vulture fund illegally evicted a woman and her son with special needs from their home of 20 years – during an action gardaí and an asset management company linked to a convicted criminal assisted at.
Vulture fund Promontoria had obtained a Circuit Court possession order in January 2023 and footage obtained by The Ditch shows gardaí and men working for Blackwater Asset Management at the scene during the eviction.
Blackwater Asset Management is a private firm hired by lenders and asset recovery funds to seize possession of homes and other property on their behalf.
Called by The Ditch this afternoon company director Stephen Piper – previously found guilty of assault – said that there were too many evictions for him to keep track of and that he’d have to look up the specific details of the unlawful eviction at Dromin House before he could comment.
The state will pay €20,000 in damages to the woman subjected to the illegal eviction after the court ruled the asset management company wasn’t liable.
A breach of their constitutional right
Judge Oisín Quinn ruled on 18 June that the warrant used to remove Yeoksee Ooi and her family from their home in February 2025 wasn’t validly issued.
He also ruled the eviction breached the family’s constitutional right to their home. Quinn’s ruling notes that Ooi had lived in the house for two decades with her partner and their three children.
One son was sitting his mock Leaving Cert the day of the eviction while another was at university in Dublin. She stopped working in 2013 to care for her son with special needs.
Judge Quinn ruled the warrant used to remove the family was invalid for two reasons. It failed to name Wicklow’s court messenger, the official legally required to carry out the eviction, and the county registrar didn’t review it before her signature was stamped onto it.
The court also found there was no meaningful engagement with the plaintiff or her family, a failure to assess the presence of a minor and a vulnerable adult and the imposition of extremely short compliance timeframes.
This amounted to a breach of the standard required under Article 40.5 of the constitution in relation to the inviolability of the dwelling, Quinn ruled.
One of the directors of the company that carried out the eviction is Stephen Piper who in 2002 pleaded guilty at Waterford Circuit Court to assault causing harm. The incident was described in court as an entirely unprovoked attack.
While on bail Piper set a boxer dog on a garda who’d confronted him Piper carrying a hammer and two knives.
Speaking to The Ditch this afternoon Piper acknowledged his role at Blackwater but denied any knowledge of the illegal eviction. “I was out of the country at the time,” he said.
Blackwater Asset Management said it doesn’t comment on individual cases.
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