IN 2008, the Guyana Court of Appeal, by a majority judgment, affirmed a High Court ruling which found that a trustee had planned to takeover the New Amsterdam property of 75-year-old Ena George who had given him money to rebuild it. The decision was that she should be granted the relief she sought, which was that she was the rightful owner of the 36, Stanleytown, New Amsterdam property.
The majority judgment of the Court came from Justices of Appeal, Mr. Charles Ramson, S.C.  (now Attorney-General) and  Ms. Yonette Cummings-Edwards.     The dissenting judge was Mr.  Ian Chang, S.C., now an acting Chief Justice.
The facts of the matter was that in 1980, the plaintiff (George)and her daughter, the second defendant, who was married to the first defendant(the trustee, Collymore),  moved into a the New Amsterdam property which was being rented at the time.
Three years later, she gave US$1000 to the first defendant (her son-in-law)to make a down-payment on the property. On moving to the United States sometime later, she sent the balance to pay off for the property.
Owing to the condition the building was in, however, it was demolished and a new wooden one was erected in its place.  Renovations were also carried out with money sent by the plaintiff and handed over to the defendants.  But unbeknown to the plaintiff, the first defendant somehow managed to obtain transport of the property in his name.
Upon learning of this, the plaintiff filed action seeking, inter alia, a declaration that it was she who was the owner of the property and not her son-in-law, Collymore, whom she had made her trustee.
At  trial, the plaintiff gave evidence, but the defendants, now resident  overseas, chose not to attend court, but rely on their attorney who gave evidence on their behalf. The trial judge granted the plaintiff the relief sought, while the first defendant appealed on the grounds that, inter alia:
(1) the trial judge had failed  to exercise his discretion to grant him an adjournment so he could return to Guyana and testify; and
(2) the laws of Guyana did not recognize the equitable concept of a trust, but if it did, the judge had been in error for concluding that a resulting trust had arisen.
With Chang dissenting, the Court of Appeal held that:
(1) In light of the fact that neither parties resided in the USA, and that the plaintiff  had returned to Guyana  to prosecute her case and remained there over the period of postponements granted by the learned trial judge  under  Ord. 33, r 4,  to allow for the first defendant to be present to testify in his defence, coupled with the age of the plaintiff (75), it would not have been expedient  in the interest of  justice  to further  adjourn the trial under the same provision; and
(2)in the instant case, the trial judge had found as a fact that the plaintiff had given the first defendant money over a period of time to purchase the property in issue for herself, but the latter, by stealth, engineered the passing of the conveyance in his own name,  under Section 35 of the Deeds Registry Act, Chapter 5: 01.
The Appeal Court found that the first defendant  had, therefore, been in a fiduciary position, vis-vis-vis  the plaintiff,  and the uncontradicted  testimony  had been to the effect  that the property had not only been purchased, but substantially rehabilitated after its conveyance over a period of time with money entrusted to the first defendant upon a written request by him to the plaintiff.
To this, the first defendant had irrefragably been a trustee for the plaintiff and whether an express, constructive, or a resulting trust, it would be inequitable not divest him of that legal title. By virtue of Section 7 of the Court of Appeal Act, the court was entitled to confirm, vary, amend or make any such order as the Court might have made.     
In his judgment , Justice Ramson said among other things: “This appeal raises a commonplace concern with respect to the interrelationship between parents and their scions  in whose names  immovable property  is conveyed by purchases or transfer simpliciter.
“The agony of any,  if not all, disputes culminates  in litigation, with an outpouring  of emotion which further divides the parties, whatever the ruling of the courts.
“Along the journey of life,  relationships constructed on the basis of trust  that ought to be milestones are fractured  by greed,  covetousness,  diabolical selfishness and not infrequently , inexplicable intransigence.
“Paradoxically, it is the law of trusts to which the courts must turn in a bid to recue the aggrieved party, if the picayune beneficiary  was  to be divested  of his/her benefactor’s  ci-devant property  Tyndall v . Tyndall (Civil Appeal No. 32/94) are two such cases, and though dissimilar in factual contents, raised not dissimilar jurisprudential polemics.
“The Ancient County, Berbice, was once home to a quaint  rural community in the early 1980s, and two of the litigants in this appeal formed part of that environment.
“The second named defendant in the action out of which the instant appeal arose is the only daughter  of the  respondent, whose culture prompted her to give,  as she put it, ‘the first preference to look after my business.’” 
Justice of Appeal Ramson and Justice Cummings-Edwards had referred to 46 cases in support of their majority judgment, which affirmed the order of the learned trial judge, subject to rights of the mortgagee acquired prior to the commencement of the action.
Justice Chang, however, begged to differ, saying: “I  found myself in the regrettable position of disagreement with that majority decision.”