Cazaly Resources Ltd's three year battle with Rio Tinto Ltd over the ownership of the Shovelanna iron ore deposit entered its final chapter Friday with the stoush going before the High Court of Australia.
The junior explorer swooped on Shovelanna, which is located in Western Australia's Pilbara region, in 2005 when Rio Tinto's license over the tenement expired after a courier failed to deliver documents on time.
Cazaly arranged financial backing for a potential development and signed an agreement with BHP Billiton Ltd to process the ore before the tenement was stripped from the company by the state government and handed back to Rio Tinto.
An appeal by Cazaly to the Supreme Court of Western Australia to wrest back control of Shovelanna was dismissed in August.
Cazaly shares have entered a trading halt following the hearing of the company's application for special leave to appeal the Shovelanna decision before the High Court in Canberra.
The company's shares last traded at 21 cents.
Shovelanna has sat in the portfolio of Rio Tinto and its partners - Gina Rinehart's Hancock Prospecting and Michael Wright's Wright Prospecting - since 1981.
Little work was conducted on the tenement after a 130 million tonne resource was defined.
Cazaly's shares surged to a high of $2.40 before the tenement was handed back to Rio Tinto in April 2006 after the then WA resources minister John Bowler used his discretion under the states Mining Act.
© 2008 AAP
