Judge settles Sir Sean’s neighbour problem

Seventy-seven-year-old Sir Sean Connery has had many reviews during a long acting career, but has probably never been described in print as "a rude, foul-mouthed, fat old man" before. Now a US Supreme Court judge has barred Sir Sean's New York neighbour from making that, and other uncomplimentary remarks, in the depositions for a legal dispute between the two.

Sir Sean has been locked in litigation with Dr Burton Sultan, a 72-year-old leading opthalmologist, for five years since Connery and his wife Micheline began using an Upper East Side apartment that belongs to their son Stephane. The doctor lodged a £16m lawsuit claiming that the rennovations on the Connery's flat - they have the top two floors, the doctor the lower four - had subjected him to noise, fumes, leaks and an infestation of rats.

The legal wrangling quickly became acrimonious, with Sultan calling Connery "a bully who ignores norms of neighbourliness and decency". He claimed Sir Sean had blasted out loud music, and when Sultan's daughter went to ask for it to be turned down she met Connery in his bathrobe - a "foul-mouthed, fat old man". The Connerys responded saying the doctor was "a tyrant" and his complaints had added to their repair costs.

Now Justice Marcy Friedman's new judgement rebukes Dr Sultan for his intemperate language, and also slams Sir Sean for his "blunderbuss" legal approach.  She has ordered the pair to 'live and let live', and also forbidden both parties from filing any more lawsuits against each other without her permission. ·