A prominent real estate agent who sought to overturn a more than $3.5 million order has been ordered to pay costs "as a mark of the court's displeasure at the pursuit of meritless litigation," a judge has said.
Francesco Anthony Morella, the director of Canberra Commercial (ACT) Pty Ltd and Canberra Commercial HR Pty Ltd, was ordered to pay the multimillion-dollar sum by the Federal Court of Australia in July 2025.
This was to be paid to Actgall, a business Canberra Commercial bought in 2022.
Just a day later, Mr Morella placed Actgall into liquidation by a shareholder resolution.
Mr Morella was a debtor of that company and owed $2.4 million in respect of an unpaid director's loan account. He was also ordered to pay just over $499,000 in interest.
Justice Angus Stewart, who presided over the 2025 hearing, said a number of ledger items on the Actgall loan to Mr Morella were "patently for personal items and not for company expenses".
Since this judgment, Canberra Commercial ACT and HR have been placed into liquidation.
The 2025 decision was made as a default judgment due to Mr Morella not appearing in court or engaging with proceedings.
That month, Mr Morella sought leave to appeal the decision but this was dismissed when he did not appear in court for a hearing.
About 10 months later, in May 2026, he filed another application to set aside the original judgment. This was later not pressed at a hearing.
On June 25, Justice Stewart dismissed the application and said it had "very poor prospects".
The judge said there had been "no adequate explanation" about why the application had been launched 10 months later and "no reasonable basis" identified to set aside the judgment.
"The plaintiffs have been put to the trouble of responding to the application for nothing," Justice Stewart said.
In addition, Mr Morella had not complied with court orders for further evidence and hearing preparation.
"That follows a long history of defaults by him in the proceeding. In the circumstances, the proper costs order to do justice between the parties and as a mark of the court's displeasure at the pursuit of meritless litigation, is to order indemnity costs against Mr Morella," Justice Stewart said.
These costs were added to a creditor's petition to declare bankruptcy.
"The application to set aside the default judgment was clearly an effort to stave off, or at least delay, the determination of the creditor's petition," the judge said.
