Setback for Ultra Tune boss Sean Buckley in his case against his ex-girlfriend Jennifer Cruz Cole

Car repair magnate Sean Buckley is suing his ex-girlfriend over secret tapes but he has been accused of going on an “impermissible fishing expedition”.

Jennifer Cruz Cole is being sued by her ex-boyfriend Sean Buckley.

Ultra Tune boss Sean Buckley has suffered a blow to his civil court action against his ex-girlfriend and former employee over secret tapes, which are now in the hands of police.

The car repair magnate is suing bikini model and mother of his child, Jennifer Cruz Cole, and his ex-worker Anthony Swords over the dissemination of a secretly taped recording that depicts an alleged assault, for which he has been hit with criminal charges.

Mr Buckley is contesting the charges.

In a preliminary judgment on Tuesday, a Supreme Court associate judge questioned whether “Ultra Tune has any viable cause of action against the defendants”.

Mr Buckley and Ultra Tune had sought orders asking the court for a “full and complete list” of everyone who was sent any recordings of his conversations.

A preliminary judgment was released in the case on Tuesday.

But Associate Justice Melissa Daly rejected the bid, calling it a “impermissible fishing expedition”.

There was also “no solid factual basis” to the magnate’s allegation that Ms Cole or Mr Swords disseminated any other recordings of private conversations, which was “a matter of mere speculation”.

Her Honour also queried what confidential information was in the recordings that Ultra Tune and Mr Buckley sought to protect.

“The fleeting references to other employees and contractors of Ultra Tune in the recording do not seem to me to be particularly

sensitive or confidential, and it is difficult to see how the disclosure of that information could cause Ultra Tune any material commercial harm,” Her Honour said.

Jennifer Cruz Cole is a former Ultra Tune employee.

Associate Justice Daly stated that after listening to the recording it was “difficult to see how it supports a claim by Ultra Tune for injunctive relief” against Ms Cole or Mr Swords in that they breached confidentiality of its “commercial secrets”.

The court also found that given Ultra Tune and Mr Buckley had not made any pleadings to its loss and damage over the saga, it was “hard to avoid a conclusion that no loss and damage has in fact been suffered”.

Ultra Tune and Mr Buckley were ordered to refile their statement of claim, striking out any reference to other recordings, or to mental harm suffered by the millionaire if he had no proof that he experienced any “ recognised psychological or psychiatric injury”.

Despite the preliminary judgment, the civil case has been delayed until after Mr Buckley faces a criminal trial over allegations of assaulting and stalking Ms Cole in the County Court in February.