A Bodmin family’s Labrador, found himself at the centre of a legal dispute after a delivery driver claimed that the ‘active, lively and friendly’ dog had damaged his car and his arm to the tune of 3,000.

Six-year-old Labrador Marley was accused of scratching the paintwork on Sean Dore’s car and biting his arm as Mr Dore delivered a takeaway meal to a farmhouse near Bodelva, south Cornwall, in July 2021. The following day, Mr Dore, 37, of Trewoon, St Austell, presented Marley’s owners with a quote for 185 for scratches on his car to be repaired and subsequently filed a claim for injury worth up to 3,000.

But Marley’s owners’ home insurer AXA was suspicious, particularly when the family’s evidence that Marley had been friendly and at most bumped into Mr Dore, was backed up by CCTV footage showing Marley, tail wagging, enthusiastically greeting the delivery driver. Medical examinations also found no sign of the ‘deep scratches’ Mr Dore said the dog had inflicted.

Mr Dore attempted to claim that the video footage had been ‘doctored’ but Deputy District Judge Healey sitting at Plymouth County Court dismissed his case as ‘fundamentally dishonest’ and ordered Mr Dore to pay Marley’s owners’ legal costs worth 4,788.90.

Clyde & Co was instructed by AXA and conducted the investigation into Mr Dore’s claim.

Damian Rourke, partner at Clyde & Co in Manchester, said: “When Sean Dore met Marley, he clearly thought he’d found a cunning way of getting his car repaired for free and...

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