Tuesday 25 November 2008

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 17.

After much pushing the Intellectual Property Office had to come up with a decision on the application Busbridge made to rectify their records. Normally a Hearing Officer will come up with a decision within two months and this time it has taken the current one (a Mr Foley) 11 months.....I wonder why? In total it has taken the IPO a total of 1year and 11 months from the time Busbridge applied to appeal the decision of HO Landau who found for me, to issuing this decision. It is my opinion that the IPO has deliberately and cynically held up proceedings in the hope I would in the meantime kick the bucket. Them knowing that I had had a heart attack in 2002 and the possibility is that I could have another one. That way they get a thorn in their side, out of the way. They know full well that I want to get a full Judicial Review of the whole case going back to 1992, and looking into all their cases of continual maladministration. they know that before I can even apply for a J.R I have to exhaust every avenue of complaint through the IPO. So by getting their own Hearing Officer to issue yet another perverse decision in favour of Busbridge, means I have to waste even more time appealing it. So that is exactly what they have done.

Having employees of their own look, at applications and appeals, is the same of the Police, the solicitors, barristers, judges, doctors and dentists etc all regulating themselves. We all know what a fantastic biased job they all do....don't we?

I will not relate in full what the decision said otherwise you will all fall asleep as it's very long. Long on waffle and obscure ramblings which make it look like he's doing a full and thorough job.
Which of course he isn't. In short Busbridge was applying to be able to say the following:- Back in 1992 he and his brother applied to register my trademark Viper, this as a partnership trading as Cobretti Engineering. Less than a year later the partnership broke up because Martin Busbridge had applied for a loan for the business, and due to his brothers uselessness, it was all wasted in quick order and Martin was up for losing his house. His marriage fell apart and he rowed with his brother Bob over it all and he did a runner never to be seen again.
Shortly after this in 1993, Bob goes bankrupt. So we have here the fact that the application (to register) should be now out of date. The business Cobretti Engineering was defunct and Bob was a bankrupt and the application was for an asset (the trading mark) could not be owned by him. He did not do anything to change the wording of the application at that time. He and his brother had in early 1992 approached Chrysler posing as the bona fide owners of the mark, to sell it to them for between £500,000 and a £million. So of course Bob hid this fact from the Insolvency Service (IS) and they being as useless as the IPO never even had a meeting with Bob it was all just a paper exercise, as bankruptcies in 1992 were running as high as now (it being the last recession we had) so my complaint with the IPO, if you have read all of this blog you will know, is that they, even though I told them of the bankruptcy back in 1994/5, did buggerall, and have gone on doing buggerall about it despite my continually banging on about it ever since.
I also had a go at the IS in 1994/5 about the hiding of the asset and they did nowt as well. (TYPICAL OF ALL GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS, DON'T YOU THINK?)
When Landau came up with his decision saying that as Bob never got Martin to sell him his 50% of the business, he never owned it all, so the application was never his to forward onto registration. Plus his bankruptcy meant that the asset of the mark would belong to the I.S. So in effect Busbridge had to lose the registration of my Mark,which he had conned the IPO in 2004  (the Reyolds Hearing) into giving him. So he appealed this, and off we went on another round of time wasting.
Back in 1992 when Bob knew he was heading for bankruptcy and he says he started a new company which he called Autotrak Ltd. He says he assigned all the assets of Cobretti Engineering to that company, but he still continued trading as Cobretti Engineering upto to his bankruptcy in 1993, thus hoodwinking the public that they owned all the assets, but which he now had hidden. This of course is illegal, to knowingly shift assets out of a business that is trading without any hope of avoiding bankruptcy. (the I.S. did not cotton onto that one) The assignment was kept quiet for obvious reasons and it wasn't until 2002 that he then notified the IPO that he had allegedly done it. I firmly believe that an assignment was never made in 1992 and he only went through the motions of belatedly doing it 10 years later, on legal advice as he just had to show the IPO that at the time he made the application or soon after, the mark was assigned to Autotrak Ltd, and wasn't with Cobretti Engineering.
Of course I protested very loudly about all this and pointed out that IPO law said that they had to be notified within 6 months of any assignment and that wasn't obviously done, plus all the paperwork was very suspicious and not legal. This was at the hearing where Busbridge was applying to register the mark and this back in 2004. H/O Reynolds said the assignments would have to be looked at and Landau when he did this, did not touch on the assignments, because as he said the application had to fail on the breakup of the partnership and other facts.
So Busbridge appealed his decision but only on the business of the alleged assignment, and his appeal would be heard by an 'appointed person' who turned out to be a prominent QC, and not to the High Court. (as I would have been forced to do-over appealing the application to register hearing by Reynolds). This really annoys me because I had to let the appeal go and lose the case to Busbridge just because I could not afford to go to the High Court, yet Busbridge makes an appeal to do with the same case, or a continuation of it and he has a later (after 1994) rule applied to him which means he can use the free option of seeing an appointed person and not a normal IPO Hearing Officer, who I found out later is employed by the Government Legal Department.
After waiting about 8 month, that meeting with this QC took place. Again because of stupid IPO rules I was refused to be part of that process, yet it was to do with a case that I was involved in...can you believe this? What a cosy little meeting that turned out to be and I wasn't at all confident it would go my way. I expected to get the decision of it in about two months-yet month after month went by and no decision. I kept on to the IPO and all I got was that it was before an 'independent person' (not in their employment) and they had no say in the matter. I even got my MP (Chris Chope) onto it after 9 months of waiting and he got the same brush off from no less than the IPO CEO. This all happened at the end of 2007/ beginning 2008.
I heard from the IPO in January that Busbridge was now putting in an application to 'rectify the register' and have it recorded that the application should now read that it is in the name only of Bob Busbridge trading as Cobretti Engineering. This of course flew in the face of Landaus decision which had never been activated due to the appeal. The appeal decision had not been heard either, as in May 2008 I am told that back in September 2007 Busbridge had dropped his appeal to the QC and to me this should have meant that the Landau decision should now have been enacted. But the IPO would ignore all that which is outrageous. Even more outrageous was the fact that all this meant that the IPO had deliberately lied to me and my MP by saying the decision had not been made and nothing they could do, yet it had been dropped all the time!!!
THIS SHOWS ONCE AGAIN WHAT THE IPO ARE ALL ABOUT AND NOT ONLY THAT -THE FACT THAT BUSBRIDGE WAS EVEN ALLOWED TO APPEAL THE LANDAU DECISION GOES ABSOLUTELY AGAINST ALL THE LEGAL RULES-IF ONE CAN APPEAL A LEGAL DECISION OF A COURT. THE RULES ARE THAT TO BE ABLE TO OBTAIN AN APPEAL YOU HAVE TO SHOW THAT YOU HAVE NEW EVIDENCE THAT SHOWS THE ORIGINAL DECISION. LIKE NEW WITNESSES HAVE COME FOWARD WITH NEW EVIDENCE THAT WOULD SHOW THE DECISION WAS WRONG OR THAT THE JUDGE IN THE HEARING MADE LEGAL MISTAKES OR EVEN FELL ASLEEP IN THAT HEARING OR WHATEVER. YOU SIMPLY CANNOT JUST SAY "I DON'T LIKE THE DECISION AND I WANT IT HEARD AGAIN" YET THE IPO GAVE HIM THE RIGHT TO APPEAL AND IF YOU READ BUSBRIDGES WRITTEN REASONS AS TO WHY HE SHOULD BE GIVEN AN APPEAL.....THEY ARE A NONSENSE . WHY DID THE IPO IGNORE THE RULE AND GIVE HIM AN APPEAL?????  AS FAR AS I AM CONCERNED THE IPO HAD AN AGENDA TO STOP ME FROM EVER KEEPING MY TRADE MARK FOR ALL THE EVIDENCE SHOWS THAT THIS MUST BE THE CASE AS THERE CANNOT BE ANY OTHER REASON FOE ALL THE CORRUPT ACTS THEY CARRIED IN FROM DAY ONE TO THE END.

Busbridges application to rectify made in Jan 2007 was eventually heard in July 2008 and I have been waiting again ever since for the decision. One reason for this long hold up, was the incredible and I believe illegal decision to grant over six months for Busbridge to FIND HIS LONG LOST BROTHER, MARTIN!!! This so he could persuade him 16 years after the event, to grant him 100% of a defunct partnership and thus allow the rectification process to go ahead. Of course it would get rid of Landaus reasons for not allowing the registration of the mark to continue. I find this so outrageous and possibly illegal that it can only have been allowed by the IPO as they favour Busbridge winning so they can be proved to have acted properly over the bankruptcy etc etc. Also to make it so I had lost. All this strengthens my desire to have a Judicial Review of all the goings on by the IPO. Of course he would never be able to find his brother and even if he did I doubted he would ever get him to agree.
Lets face it the break up was monumentally done with bad blood, and Martin had never been seen or heard of in 16 years being abroad most of this time, yet the IPO gave him all this time at my expense. Of course he did not find him or get his 50% of the partnership and application to register. So the application had to be now looked at. I had given all my reasons as to why it should be denied and I had my say about all the documents Busbridge had put in as so called evidence.

I had to keep on to the IPO yet again over a slow decision coming forth and eventually after all this pressure as now they could not use the excuse that it was an independent QC, they came up with it last week. Well I never expected them to find for me, and true enough they didn't. Yet again a deeply flawed decision full of mistakes about the facts and the reading of the evidence that Busbridge came up with. So now I have to waste yet more time in appealing this and I have quickly drawn up the appeal with a long statement and documentary evidence.

The decision in a nutshell was on only two points. 1/ Because when the partnership of the Busbridges broke up and they drew up an agreement saying that Bob would take responsibility for all the debts, THIS ALSO MEANT THAT MARTIN WAS HANDING OVER THE BUSINESS TO HIS BROTHER AS WELL AND SO NO NEED FOR IT TO BE ASSIGNED OR SOLD.

 2/ On the business of the bankruptcy even though by law the Receiver should have taken over that asset, because Bubsridge came up with a letter from the Insolvency Service dated only in August 2008 in which they said they had had no interest in the asset, this meant that he was in the clear over all that. This is again an outrageous decision and shows a biased favouritism by the IPO towards Busbridge, as I showed that this letter was not worth a light and not legal.

First it was never proved that the asset had been assigned away from Cobretti and when I asked the Insolvency Service first in 2004 and again in 2007 to let me have all the facts about the bankruptcy, they replied that they had destroyed all the files and could make no comments either way as they simply could not remember. (That in itself stinks and can it be true??) Yet after this and for Busbridge, they can suddenly remember with remarkable clarity that they had not been interested in the mark asset. It is painfully obvious that the I.S are as big a bunch of liars and cheats as the IPO and who know their handling of the bankruptcy was deeply flawed and they want shut of it. So here I am still some way off getting Justice which I wonder if I will ever get. Will I be able to get a Judicial Review on legal aid???
Certainly no barrister if they have read this blog has offered to help, but as I've said that does not surprise me at all as they seem to only want fistfuls of money to even look at you let alone speak to you.

One last thing is that the decison of this last H.O, Foley, shows that the cosy meeting between Busbridge and HOBBS QC, was probably not legal either. It is clear the QC Hobbs gave Busbridge so much legal advice as to how he could take steps to win, by dropping his appeal and applying for rectification and saying and showing certain facts and documents. This when he should have stuck ONLY to hearing Busbridges reasons as to the legality of the assignment. As it was, all he seems to have done is discussed with him all sorts of other matters and the assignment was not dealt with. He obviously advised Busbridge to drop the appeal and take the other steps he did. Surely this is illegal as well. Hence why it is imperative I get a Judicial Review into all these shonky goings on from 1992 to date.

Tuesday 7 October 2008

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 16.

7th Oct.2008.

I decided I had had enough of them holding me up so decided to send in to their general enquiries an email just asking them how long would one normally expect to have to wait for a hearing officer to come up with his decision. I never told them my name. They came back with what I THOUGHT THEY WOULD SAY, NAMELY AROUND TWO MONTHS! This because the previous two decisions both took only two months.

So now I went back to Raoul Colombo the manager of the Law Section and reminded them that it was now 6 MONTHS since the hearing and I was beginning to wonder if there was something underhanded going on with the Patent Office, taking this long. This got them going and after continually telling me he couldn't do anything, now he promised a result by mid October.

However knowing the way the P.O works, by not keeping to their own laws and rules, I am not holding my breath as to what the final decision is going to be. As far as I am concerned it is a quite simple situation. He appealed the original hearing decision saying he had no right to the trademark and giving all the legal reasons, and his appeal reasons were dropped and he changed tack and asked for the records of the original application to be allowed to be changed. (this after
16 years) He wanted the original application in the name of the defunct partnership to be changed to just his name. How he can have this allowed I do not know as the previous hearing officer clearly said that as the partnership collapsed, and he did not have his brothers permission to take over his half of the business and it's assets, and that as he had gone bankrupt anyway, so the application was therefore dead. SO HOW CAN THE RECORDS BE CHANGED? especially 16 years later.

I bet the PO will concoct some excuse as I doubt if they want it to be seen that they have ignored my protestations about all this for 16 plus years, and never did anything. So they need to restore my non existent faith in them.

Tuesday 5 August 2008

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 15.

Yesterday I sent an email to the P.O asking why it was taking their hearing officer, so long to come to his conclusion. To remind you Busbridge appealed against the decision of the last Hearing Officer, Landau, that he had had no right to apply to register the Trade Mark Viper. He quoted many legal reasons for coming to that concusion.
Busbridge appealed but dropped the appeal and then tried a different tack to nullify that decision. It did not work, and so now this hearing officer should complete his report. However I am constantly wondering, what has he got to think about? The previous H/O made his decision, the appeal was dropped, so inevitably the decision then HAS TO STAND!! So what the hell has he got to spend FOUR MONTHS thinking about?? But then the P.O is like that. EVERYTHING TAKES FOREVER.
I wonder if they are up to something, maybe marking time until a time limit is up, or something like that? I don't trust them, for if this guy confirms the last decision it makes the P.O look incompetent as why didn't they come to that decision in 1992/3? The decision of the first H/O
took two months and it's been four now, so watch this space.

Sunday 22 June 2008

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 14.


Whilst I wait for the snail IPO to come up with a decision on a decision, if they ever do, a thought crossed my mind.

The brainless Hearing Officer, Reynolds, at my opposition to Busbridge registering the Mark said I had lost the rights to the Mark by not keeping control of the advertising of same. (at around 1991) Now even if he was right about that, and you have read my thoughts on that, I feel some questions aught to be asked:-

1/ Why did he not recommend that my own registration be squashed?
2/ If that was the case why did the IPO in 2002 allow me registration?
3/ If that were the case why did Chryslers expensive and learned lawyers who knew what my trading history had been,(don't forget their hearing was held in 1998, well after 1991, and who had Busbridge advising them on everything that he and I were doing trade wise) not apply for my registration to be declared Invalid?
4/ If that were the case why did the IPO allow Busbridge to have registration, thus create
a situation where two individuals having the very same Mark for the very same category, and products? Which I beleive is in contravention of their own laws?

It is all another example of the baffling and inconsistent way the IPO work.

Saturday 21 June 2008

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 13.

Before I cover the decision of the alleged assignments, I have to mention what was going on with the never ending farce of the Invalidity action. From mid 2004 to the decision at the last quarter of 2005, Busbridge continued with his futile action of trying every trick in the book to admit as much damning accusations against me, of a personal nature. Of course due to the absolutely convoluted and snail like way the IPO conducts all its business, everything takes an age and is incredibly complicated. Whilst I have no sympathy with Busbridge as he took this path because of his vexatious litigant ways, it is the same with all British so called Justice. As far as I am concerned British Justice is deliberately made more difficult, slow and overcomplicated, so that all the twats in it can make a nice cosy living out of it. All the lawyers make millions out of it because most of it cannot be understood by mere mortals. The longer it drones on the more money they make out of it. If the paths down which you are forced to go, resemble a labyrinth, then again they will take ages to get along and that equals more money again. It just makes people like me livid and extremely "Raging Mad". Others are more apathetic and supine and let them get away with it.
About October/November 2005 the decision was eventually made known. I must say that this was the only time I ever felt really vindicated, in all the time from 1992. The official who made the decision (he was a hearing officer but thankfully not Reynolds) was a fellow called Landau. God Bless his cotton socks.
What he had to say in one way, as I said, vindicated everything I had ever said, about this whole sorry saga. But in another way I have to say that what he did say should have been said right back in about 1994, or earlier and he could have said much more than he did. For what he said was this:-
1/ The original application to register was made in the name of Robert and Martin Busbridge (a partnership) trading as Cobretti Engineering.


2/ The partnership broke up and what should have happened LEGALLY, is that if Bob Busbridge wanted to continue the business, he should have got his brother to sign over his half of of the business. This never happened and I know that Martin probably would have died first rather than do it.
3/ So any alleged assignment could not have taken place as was claimed as it was done only by Bob, and not the two.
4/ The company went bankrupt so no Trade Mark could be awarded to it.

These were things I had said ad infinitum to the IPO ONLY TO OBVIOUSLY-BE IGNORED !!!!

So in effect Busbridge now was stuffed and all I had demanded over the years was now being said to be right all along. Don't they make you mad? Why couldn't the IPO HAVE HAD A MEETING WHEN I BROUGHT UP THESE POINTS IN 1993/4 AND COME TO THE SAME CONCLUSIONS? They would have saved me a great deal of trouble, money and time. My business would have prospered and no doubt I would not have suffered a heart attack. I would have ended up at retirement with enough saved to have a decent retirement instead of what I have now. Frankly I could go to Cardiff and **** all the ****** in the IPO to Kingdom come. Now you would think all my troubles were going to be over, wouldn't you? But we are dealing here with stupid incompetent civil servants and their mindless never ending bureaucracy AND A GROWING REALISATION THAT THERE WAS A LOT MORE TO ALL THIS THAN MET THE EYE!! WHY WERE THEY OBVIOUSLY OUT TO STUFF ME AND WHICH WAY THEY COULD ???

Of course the British Establishment has to show everyone how fair it is to everyone, so the PO just had to show this lying, cheating piece of robbing shit called Busbridge, a chance to appeal that decision.
Now this does as usual not happen anytime soon. Busbridge can get to appeal, not by having to go to the High Court like I did with his registration opposition loss, no because the decision was made in 2005, even though it concerned what was done in a case held under the 1938 Act. How do you square that with logic and common decency and thought for JUSTICE????? I wanted to appeal that original registration opposition decision and I wanted to do that in 2004!! Yet they did not say to me "well OK Mr Cook as it is 2004 you can do that cheaply through the IPO, using an independent QC" Which is what Busbridge was allowed to do with his appeal as he'd now put in to appeal the Landau decision that found for me.There simply is no Justice and when I complained I just get brushed off. He was able to say to the IPO - I want my appeal to be heard, not by an IPO hearing officer but by what they call an 'Independent             lawyer who is put forward to hear this appeal by the Government Legal Department - and get this-or they came up with a QC called Hobbs. I later found out that he was the countries foremost IP lawyer in the land and heard all the IPO's top hearings that involved many of the coutries biggest companies when they were spending millions to protect their valuable Trade Marks and Copyrights. YOU HAVE TO ASK-WHY IT WAS THAT BUSBRIDGE GOT THIS TOP MAN, WHO IN NO WAY COULD BE SAID TO BE INDEPENDENT OF THE IPO AND DECISIONS AGAINST THEIR FINDINGS THAT WERE BEING APPEALED. IT SIMPLY STINKS TO HIGH HEAVEN AND YOU WILL SEE WHY WHEN YOU SEE THE TRANSCRIPT OF THAT HEARING AND ALL THAT WENT ON BEFORE THE HEARING AND AFTER IT. IF EVER THERE WAS AN OUTRIGHT CORRUPT ACTION BY A GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENT.....THIS IS IT !!!!!!!!! AND IT CONCERNS A TOPIC THAT IS ABSOLUTELY OF SUPREME IMPORTANCE TO ALL PEOPLE IN THIS COUNTRY WHO PRODUCE INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY APPERTAINING TO PRACTICALLY EVERYTHING THAT IS DESIGNED AND PRODUCED BY BRITISH INDIVIDUALS AND COMPANIES SMALL & LARGE. .....most people in this country haven't a clue about 'Intellectual Property'-including by the looks of it- many journalists who should know better !

HENCE WHY ANYONE LOOKING AT THIS CASE SHOULD REALISE THE IMPORTANCE OF WHAT WENT ON IN IT. FOR WHAT HAPPENED TO ME COULD HAPPEN TO ANYONE IN THE FUTURE AND IN ANYCASE COULD ALSO HAVE ALREADY HAPPENED TO OTHERS I PAST YEARS............YOU ABSOLUTELY HAVE TO USE YOUR VERY BEST IMAGINATION TO ENABLE YOU TO SEE THE WOOD FOR THE TREES IN THIS STORY !!!!!!!!!!!                    

The hearing of that appeal was heard late 2005, and I was not allowed to be present. even thoughit was about my Trade Mark and someone trying to steal it. More petty fogging injustice. I never got to hear what was said or anything. The outcome was that Busbridge was said to me after it was heard, to have dropped his appeal, by dropping his appeal about the assignments. It looked suspiciously like this QC and he had a good old chat, Busbridge puts on his severely hard done by, little boy who is so good, he wouldn't say boo to a goose act, and gets free advice to apply now for 'an adjustment' to the records and to now change the IPO records to show that the application name (for his registration of my Trade Mark) was changed to just Bob Busbridge applying for Registration" Can you believe it? Well of course you can in this country were justice always seems to come second to giving in to all the cockroaches and crims. You will see later on what Busbridges brother who dusddenyly appeared on the scene for don't forget Robert Busbridges business was as a partnership with his brother and the IPO knew this but are quite happy to airbrush him out of existence even after one of their hearing officers had said all this should not happen.....he was probably sacked for going against what the IPO obviously wanted to happen.

Now the really annoying thing is that after the hearing with the QC, I had to wait for nearly two years to even find out what was went on. THE CORRUPTION JUST KEEPS ROLLING ON NON STOP SO KEEP READING. I kept emailing the PO as to what the hell was going on after that hearing finished. All I got back was shoulder shrugging and "well it is out of our hands as we cannot dictate to a QC what to do" Thanks a bunch you useless *****, and who made up these rules in the first place? Why didn't you think about that? Even my MP- Chope couldn't get an answer, but he did eventually get one off their CEO and it was a pack of lies. What was said turned out to be more lies and you can see further on what the lies were.

I had had enough of all this by now, and I thought I would have another go at reporting the IPO to the Ombudsman. I knew they would do nothing, but a lot of new complaints were now in the arena, especially their CEO lying. I put a full report in.......have a guess how I got on !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yes your right.....I got F***ing nowhere again. I will not go into detail here, detailing every point they made as again-it was all LIES and I have the documents all in full-all about this However I wasn't going to have it with this pushing aside of my complaints, so I appealed to them and listed 12 complaints on how they failed to deal with my original points, so I quote their reply:-(after a full page of meaningless waffle)
1/ They had no grounds in which they could investigate the IPO. (Even though I gave them all the evidence and within that there is are all the grounds-so they chose to ignore it all.
2/ "We can in principle investigate complaints about administration actions of the IPO. We investigate in cases where a complainant has suffered because they received a poor service or were not treated properly or fairly and the PO had not put things right and we believe that an investigation by us would resolve matters. While I appreciate your strength of feeling, I can see no evidence that an investigation would resolve matters" (Can you belive all that? For I suffered from all they quote but it shows how determined they all were to stop me from getting Justice....covil servants all covering up for each other !!!
I do not know about you but all those lies and deceit just make me want to be sick. This because of the never ending complaints I had to make to the IPO over 16 years and none of them rectified. How their original ignoring of my complaints over bankruptcy etc led to much hardship and loss of money by me, how I had shown how unfairly I had been treated at every turn. Of course they can see no reason to investigate, because they do not want to see anything.
3/ They then go and say that they cannot investigate matters were the complainant can appeal.
Of course it matters not one jot that the appeal they are talking about is a High Court appeal. Now I did not complain about the decision of the hearing officer re the opposition to Busbridge application to register.(I couldn't afford to) I complained that we should never have got to that stage. So those remarks are a cynical ploy to muddy the waters. order to make that appeal? But in this case it had nothing to do with my complaints. So another blot on the so called justice system we have to suffer.Even so how can one have a right to appeal if one has to be rich in order to amke an appeal in the first place?????

Back to the waiting for what was happening to the appeal, by Busbridge, I heard in about March 2008 that Busbridge had in November 2007, decided to drop the appeal and concentrate on getting the records changed. (as advised by Hobbs!!) An abuse of the system if there ever was. However my first complaint was why did the IPO at around that time not tell me he had dropped the appeal?? Why did they tell my MP (Chope) through their CEO that they did not know, nor could they find out what was happening. When all along of course they knew. (Because at that appeal was their chief Hearing Officer alongside his mate Hobbs !!!!!) They even had given the bastard Busbridge three months to come up with evidence to back up his application, and this included having to find his brother and to get out of him a statement saying he gave up his rights to the mark and the business. I do not know about you, but this is just horrific. The IPO is now saying that they are willing to ignore the findings and decision of their own hearing officer Landau as to the legalities that were not adhered to by Busbridge back in 1992/3. Now 16 years later they would bend over backwards and allow this lying, cheating and manipulating toerag to just like that, change history and the books. All he had to do was ask to change the records and put himself as being the applicant of that original registration application. If you read the decision of Landau he clearly states that he can come to no other decision, as the law was the law, and that's that. His hands are tied. Yet now the IPO apparently seem to think they can ignore all that. I feel sick just thinking about it.
So I am once more in the never ending roller coaster of Busbridge submitting statements full of lies and irrelevant crap and my having to make counter statements to refute what he says-ALL THE TIME.
They even show their bias by after three months, to give him another six months to find his brother. Of course he doesn't find him and will probably will never find him as he has been out of his brothers life since 1993 and I am absolutely sure that the break up was so bad he just has never wanted to see him again. (but hold on here as he does come to me in 2009 to be my witness) For all I know he may dislike his brother even more than I do, and that says a lot, doesn't it.
So Busbridge doesn't get his statement. He plows on regardless, filling up ages and pages of irrelevant waffle. Cutting through all his shit, it basically comes down to the following:-


1/ After he went bankrupt he carried on trading even so, and always used the Mark and he always called his company Cobretti. He supplies endless copies of adverts over years and none of them show he used the trading name of Cobretti Engineering (this is important as he is trying to say there is a Status Quo situation here)
2/ I point out that when he says that he hasn't dropped his appeal, so that means the case must revert to the original decision to strip him of the Mark, he is lying as I have it in writing from the IPO CEO. He still says he hasn't dropped it.
3/ He lies when he states he has used the Cobretti Engineering trading name extensively right through to present date. Trouble is none of his adverts show this but the IPO chose to ignore this fact.

I obviously replied knocking down each and every lying assertion he made. I cannot believe that the PO would believe all the feeble efforts he has made to lie his way through this, yet here I am six months after his last statement and mine, still waiting for the constipated IPO to make a decision.
I wrote to the Head of their Law Section? a Mr Colombo ( a very apt name) but he's not a patch on the real one. Probably has his hands tied. I complained about Busbridge making perjurous statements about him dropping his appeal. A letter was sent in April telling him that he had dropped the appeal.....end of story. The application to rectify the register was being heard by a hearing officer. (That was 9th April, here we are at the 21st June not far off three months later and still no word from IPO) Willing to take bets as to what they will say at the end game???? Keep reading.

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 12.

I turned up at a building just off the Embankment at around 10am for this hearing that I had waited for for some two years. Of course His Highness the King of Lies of Sutton, was there with one of his henchmen. A Copper ( my favourite species of worm) who certainly worked for him whilst I was using him as an agent. Certainly he would have been in on Busbridges scam of ripping me off. I wondered why he was there as he would not be allowed to be part of anything. Maybe Busbridge was scared I would give him the hiding he deserves.
The hearing got under way under the directions of this hearing officer Reynolds. Can't say I liked the look of him as he seemed a miserable git. My instincts were right. The hearing took all day, and as I have no minutes of it I cannot give you a blow by blow account. I can give you the outlines and they are this:- I cannot remember if Busbridge kicked off with his verbal account or I did. It doesn't matter as we both went through what we wanted to say about our respective evidence that we had both put in. The evidence consists of a number of statements you make, they are replied to and you then make yet another statement covering what the reply said. This goes on until you both run out of stuff to say. These statements have documentary evidence alongside them, to back up what you have said.
I obviously outlined the history of my usage of the Mark from day one. How I had taken Busbridge on and what he had done to me regarding the stealing my business.. I referred to many parts of the 1994 Trade Marks Act to back up any assertions I had made as to laws that Busbridge had not kept to. I pointed out the many lies he had told, how his words could not be relied on, how he had traded dishonestly and so on. I stressed about the illegality of the alleged assignments, how I should not even be fighting this case as the PO should have thrown it out when they knew he had become a bankrupt, how the application had been made in the name of a partnership and trading name that did not even exist now.
He obviously trotted out all his lies about how I never owned the Mark anyway as the Limited Companies I owned had owned it (no evidence given to back this) and how I had stolen customers money when BRL ceased (again no evidence) and so on. All the usual guff and lies he had used before with the Chrysler action and all his statements made at the forgery case etc etc.

I think he cross examined me, and I certainly cross examined him, but I cannot go over any particular subject the cross examining covered, as all my case notes are not with me right at this moment. So I cannot remember what all the subjects and details in depth were. But they were things I thought was very important to discuss and get across.. I sensed all along that this hearing officer was pro Busbridge, who did his usual little boy lost act, and anti me the hard headed business like, no nonsense person. ( I know that many Brits guys do not like my type of personality. This I put down to the fact that many Brits blokes are wets, spineless, bleeding heart Liberals and soft as shit) This is especially so amongst the so called elite of Brit life. Those in the so called professions. But I say it is because of these bleeding useless twats that Britain has fallen so far down during my lifetime, so that I no longer am proud to be British. Of course most of the politicians and civil servants fall into this useless category. This hearing officer fell into the category of useless ***** that I hate and here I was not being judged on the truth of what I had said and shown in documentary evidence but on how this bugger saw me as a person. I of the type he obviously did not like, (isn't it funny that the Judge in the forgery case behaved just like this hearing officer and I ad the same feelings?) and indeed that is how he came to the decision he did as you will see. He made comments to me that were so obviously out of irritation, yet he was as nice a pie to Busbridge, and when I got to the stage that I wanted to go back to taking up a subject with Busbridge, he refused to allow me to do it. Therefore denying me the right to conduct my case the way I needed to. What was his excuse for doing this.....he said the case had gone on for much longer that would be normal for such a case, and that only one day had been set aside for it, it was getting on (it was about 4pm) and he had to wrap things up so he could get away and get his train. I could have killed the little useless *****, but what could I do. If I spoke out I would seriously get up his nose, even more than I may have already done. This is so called British Justice!! and this was my business life, indeed my whole life, he was messing with.

I was not hopeful really, but I thought "How can I lose as the case Busbridge put forward was so weak and full of holes" When I got the decision I was absolutely gob smacked as his reasoning was so biased, muddled, and defied logic or sense. I HAD LOST and this meant that Busbridge would be able to register the Mark, eventually. For the PO in all its glory in past years had decided that under the 1938 Act if one lost a hearing, the only way you could make an appeal was to go to the HIGH COURT. Now this was no sweat for a big company like Chrysler, but for any small business or a one man band like me, that was TOTALLY OUT AS WHO CAN AFFORD MANY TENS OF THOUSANDS TO DO THAT???? So I had to let it go as I could in no way appeal. It really irks me to think of Busbridge and all his celebrations he would have made that night. Plus his gloating.
Reynolds reasoning that I should lose was this:- I had abandoned the Mark at the point were I took on Busbridge as an agent. As I had let him advertise the Mark Viper that meant I had abandoned it. (this when the FACTS are that only I advertised the Viper car up to 1990 and he was said in those adverts to be my London agent) and after when I allowed Busbridge to advertise the kits and car  it was stated that he was my agent. This is another example of how incompetent the IPO were or was it an example of how they were so determined to get me and finish me and my business off, that they would make up lies like this to achieve my demise? Quite how he came to this statement I will never know. In his World, if Ford who manufacture cars, let dealers sell them and thus advertise them in all sorts of ways, this means the dealers own the Mark and not Ford (or any other big manufacturer). He point blank refused to believe me when I told him of the cars I was making for the London guy, the export of one car in 1991 to Holland, ( All the cars I ever made had manufacturers plates attached to their bulkheads clearly stating Classic Replicas was the manufacturer and boldly stating VIPER...Chassis Number etc) the Cobra parts I advertised and sold, the advertising I did for fully built cars, the orders I got from Busbridge for kits where the orders stated for a 'Viper' kit and so on. As far as he was concerned Busbridge was just able to take over, just like that, my Mark. What a travesty of Justice. I believe if I had had the money to take on a top IP lawyer, he would have been able to wipe the floor of this perverse judgement.
There was however a glimmer of hope, for at least he had listened to my assertions about the alleged assignments. He decreed that there should be a separate hearing to decide on them and their legality. He also decreed that the Mark could only go to the company Cobretti Engineering,
and the partnership of R & B Busbridge. Well he couldn't decree otherwise could he? This because it was they who applied in the first place. Well I think this just shows up what stupid bastards all these people in the IPO are. How can you award a Mark to a defunct and bankrupted entity, one that ceased 12 years prior???????????? They all live in cloud cuckoo land as far as I am concerned. ANOTHER CASE OF USELESS INCOMPETENT CIVIL SERVANTS!!!!!!!!!!!

Friday 20 June 2008

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 11.

Of course now I had my registration and Busbridge being told he could now also apply, meant I now had to enter yet another battle. This time to oppose his application to register the Mark,VIPER. This kicked off around the end of 2002 after I had got back from my escape from Death in Spain. The only thing I suppose I could say on the plus side was it took my mind off my health, (although I felt fine) and it gave me something to do in my retirement. It kept my mind ticking over as well.
The next eighteen months were taken up compiling my case for this opposition, compiling all the documentary evidence. I tried to stick to facts, but Busbridge would keep going on about every subject under the Sun. In my opposition to Chrysler I had used Kings, and of course that cost me. He was cheap option as he was not a lawyer, but now I could not even afford him and especially a full blown lawyer. These Intellectual Property lawyers cost the Earth with minimums of £150 and hour. Another point for anybody intending to fight to protect their IP. I could do a, .very long rant here on the whole system and on how small companies or even individuals stand no chance to protect their IP against big companies, intent to steal what you have created. Even when like me your fighting against a small time crook who is representing himself, you still stand little chance of getting it right and winning.
I had to also represent myself, so because Busbridge brought into the fight ,through his ignorance and desire to slag me off at every turn, lots of irrelevant rubbish. I was then forced to answer all his accusations. I had to make sure that I did this in case the Hearing Officer did listen to what he was ranting on about. I also did not know exactly what was relevant from a legal point. So I had to also bring up stuff which I thought I had better do, just in case.
Don't forget these hearings are supposed to be informal, and you are legally able to represent yourself. But I was told that these Hearing Officers, and especially certain ones, did not like to have to listen to a lot of irrelevant waffle. I with my luck had to end up with one of them as you will see later on.
I got together a full and comprehensive story of the history of my involvement with the Trade Mark. How I had taken on Busbridge, how I felt that I should not be having to even be fighting this battle because of his bankruptcy. How I took on Busbridge as my agent for a second time in 1989/1990. How he had been responsible for selling my kits and doing the advertising for same under my jurisdiction. How I carried on just making the fully built cars and how I gave them orders for same. Produced all the documentary evidence of their written orders for kits and copies of my invoices for same. Showed how I had produced colour pages for both our brochures and how I had advertised for Cobra/Viper parts, a small separate business I had set up for both of us too do. How I had set up a photo shoot to get a good set of photos for both Busbridge and I to use for our advertising. How I had sold Vipers in the UK, fully built, to the London guy and one car to a Dutch guy. Everything I said verbally was backed up with documentary evidence. I thought I just could not fail, and I would have to win. All this was over time, submitted to the PO and believe me it is a long tiring process made so by their anarchic rules. Also by the fact that the PO slow things down with their slowness and willingness to let your opponent off when they do not submit things in the timescale as set out.
I have studied my files on what took place in the lead up to the hearing In June 2004. I found that I had had to make no less than 11 letters of complaint to the PO. Mostly they dealt with them allowing Busbridge to put in evidence over the time limit. Also for them allowing him to allow more evidence on top of that he had already put, and somehow he had only just found. Of course he had it all the time but in his desperation to slag me off as much as he could, he wanted to cram in even more documents, all of which had already been around and could have been put in at the onset. A few times I had my way and a few times they bent over backwards and allowed him this evidence even when it was put in well over the cut off date they had given him.
I had at one stage to severely castigate them for telling him they would not allow his extra evidence, and I then had to put in a statement in reply dealing with what had been put in. Only for weeks later for him to ignore what they had said, and to put in this extra evidence which they then went and allowed. This meant I had to redo my statement completely and I had wiped my original statement where I had dealt with what they then disallowed. It meant extra postage and time wasted and I billed them for it. Do you think they ever paid for their mistake? A few of my letters of complaint were just ignored, which is a familiar pattern of events with the PO.

One big subject I had to cover in depth was his assertions that he owned the name VIPER and that at the point in time when he went bankrupt in 1993, before that he had assigned all the assets of Cobretti Engineering and this included the asset of the Mark, to a new company he had set up, called Autotrak Ltd. I pointed out that by their every own rules, assignments had to be made for a consideration IE paid for, and that the PO had to be informed of the assignment in the correct way, within SIX MONTHS. This had not been done and in fact it had taken Busbridge some TEN YEARS TO DO THIS!!. He had notified the PO only in 2003 and he also notified them of two more so called assignments after the first one. Both supposedly done in 2002 one to another company he had formed called Autotrak(Cobretti) Ltd and then the last one back to himself. Any person with the slightest intelligence could see through all this, and come to the conclusion as to the scam being carried out. The PO showed that they were just going to accept this nonsense, so I just kept onto them about it. I certainly made a big deal of it in my written evidence. Also they had included the 1992 alleged assignment in the 1994 case, yet the assignment was supposedly done in 1992 before the 1994 Act came in, so should have been dealt with under the 38Act.
I believe that when he knew that he was going to be faced with having to justify his application, he panicked. He knew I would make a big deal out of the fact that he had gone bankrupt and could not therefore say he owned the non registered Mark. I knew he was getting some legal advice and I guess he was advised to fraudulently make it appear that these assignments had been done. Of course he would also have to show that the Mark had "come back to him, nicely and in time for this hearing" This because the company Autotrak (Cobretti) Ltd did not show him as a director (due to his bankruptcy) so the last alleged assignment had to be shown. The whole think stank to high heavens, but the PO in their infinite wisdom just turned a blind eye, even though their own rules had not been kept to.
The whole of Busbridges evidence was a pack of lies and when I kept calling him a serial liar he would get most upset, however my documentary evidence showed samples of evidence for each and every statement I made about his lies. For instance during the time from his bankruptcy he had traded under no less that six trading names and using the Mark. So how could he claim that he alone was always using this Mark he claimed to own?? These different companies were using the Trade Mark Viper, yet there was no record of him assigning or licensing it to any of these companies. Sometimes a limited company, sometimes just a trading name. Why was this? It was to confuse people trying to do business with him. I knew he was short of cash still and customers were being ripped off. I researched Companies House records and found of the two companies Autotrak Ltd and Autotrak Cobretti Ltd, none had EVER PUT IN A SET OF ACCOUNTS OR REPORTS.
NOW HERE WE HAVE A PRIME EXAMPLE OF YET ANOTHER SHOWER OF INCOMPETENT CIVIL SERVANTS. I mean in Companies House. I wrote to them and blew the whistle on his activities and asked them why they had let him get off with NEVER putting in accounts etc? Eventually they scrubbed off the companies, yet they never answered any of my questions.
The exact same thing happened with YET ANOTHER SET OF INCOMPETENT CIVIL SERVANTS.....THE MOB AT THE INSOLVENCY SERVICE. I had warned them back in 1994 that he was trading illegally and was even showing himself as a director of Autotrak Ltd. That he had hidden assets like the Mark etc. I banged on to them time and again over the years, about this. Those useless bastards should have stripped him of that Mark and all the other assets he hid. Late in the day, years later they did visit him and he would put on his little boy lost looks and attitude. Butter would not melt in his mouth, he came across as such an angel, and so put upon by the big ogre Cook. The stupid gits obviously believed all he spun them. And who lost out because of them?????? All the creditors, especially if he had ever got money off Chrysler, plus the profits he made out of it all over the years off my back and what I had designed and made.

But I digress here, but civil servants give me high blood pressure. Can you name a government department in this country that works????? Nothing works we are like a banana republic. In fact some banana republics work better than we do, and at least their kleptomaniac dictators are very adept at pinching their peoples money. The wankers here couldn't even do that, as well.

Back to the lies of Busbridge in his so called evidence. He was still claiming that he owned and used the Mark going back to 1988. He conveniently never said in his evidence that this was as an agent for me and my company BRL. This was now on record and yet the PO never ever questioned this. In fact it seemed to me that they just believed everything he ever said. You will shortly see why I say this.

In November 2003 Busbridge tries yet another ploy to denigrate my honesty, now he puts in a request to include (at a late date) extra evidence that has suddenly come to light. It concerned the equally abhorrent Mr 'Liar' Findlay, and it came via the even more abhorrent Mr Tanner of Pilgrim. This obnoxious trio are as thick as thieves. Of course Busbridge only ever advertised in Kitcar magazine, owned by Tanner and of course they were busom buddies ( you know like with like and all that) Tanner tells Busbridge that he has evidence that I am a serial forger, and goes on to tell him about the legal battle Tanner had had against a Tony Barrass-way back, and to which I have indicated would reappear. So here we are again. He says he has a signed and sworn statement off Findlay (from that action) in which Findlay says I forged his signature. Thus I am a serial forger.
Busbridge did his usual trick as well, of also throwing in a whole load of other lies which either he had already brought up or were irrelevant. But sticking to the main issue, what the idiots did not either know or overlooked is that all along I could blow this accusation out of the water. Levaggi the solicitor as I told you, spoke with Findlay at length on the phone AFTER HE HAD SIGNED THE STATEMENT IN QUESTION. Levaggi was the solicitor I had taken on to go after Busbridge for breaking my copyright on my chassis design and he had asked ths Findlay bloke to sign a statement to do with my chassis. In that conversation he agreed he had signed it. I had found Levaggi as he had moved to another law firm, and he agreed to appear in any Court if wanted, to verify that it was all lies. I had not used this opportunity as it never came to having to. Now it is in the arena again this time with Busbridge.
I objected strongly to the PO against this being accepted into the case on the grounds it was all hearsay, I had Levaggi the solicitor that would verify it as lies and it was all irrelevant to the case and that the case to which it referred to, never even got to Court, so was never tested. The PO fairly quickly for them, in five months agreed and it was refused. WOW they got something right for once.

Starting about October I got yet another headache to deal with. Mr Habitual Liar Busbridge, thinks up another wheeze, or is advised of it, to denigrate me some more. He applies to have my registration, won after a TEN YEAR BATTLE against Chrysler, declared Invalid by starting a process called a Request for Declaration of Invalidity of my registration. He would on this application dredge up all the lies of before and some more. This man knew no bounds to what he could lie about. he should have been certified as a menace to society. Trouble is with the PO you can lie all you like, they are just not interested if you lie. Even when I showed them by means of documentary evidence, that he was lying, they just plowed on. Had this been in a proper Court of Law, he would eventually get done for perjury and perverting the course of justice. If I had gone to the Police I would have got nowhere as an individual.

He had to put in a statement saying why he thought my registration was invalid. The list he gives shows just how cheeky he is and what a liar he is:-
1/ I am guilty of passing off. In other words as I am making vehicles of the same design as his and using the same Mark, IT IS ME THAT IS GUILTY OF THE COPYING AND THEREFORE IT IS ME DECEIVING THE PUBLIC. In other words I am guilty of saying to the Public here is MY vehicle, when it is not my vehicle or design but his!!! I will leave you to draw your own conclusion on that.
2/ My registration should not have been allowed as he had put in an application for the Mark before me. I have touched on this already.

Boiled down to its barest, that is all he tried to rely on. Naturally I kicked up a great stink over this as I was already involved in a fight with him with my opposition to his registration and the evidence would be exactly the same for both cases. Why force anybody to have to fight two parallel cases on virtually the same subjects? I went to a local lawyer and got legal advice and it would seem that he had no case and I got much advice if I had to fight it. However I banged on to the PO over and over about why they were even allowing this to go ahead. I had to go through the motions of putting in Counter Statements and so on. This put a great deal of yet more work onto me, as if my work of opposing his application wasn't already enough to do anyway.

I will not go into detail of every letter that went between me and the PO, because it is going to be irrelevant, as you should know that after much letter writing and me arguing with the IPO, ( as is normal with anything to do with the IPO) at long last in June 2005, I got a letter off the IPO stating:-"Following a review of the proceedings it appears appropriate to suspend this invalidity application pending resolution of the recording of an assignment by Busbridge in the opposition to registration by Mr Cook." You will remember that I had kicked up a stink about the IPO allowing Busbridge to say he had assigned the Mark to himself etc. The Invalidity case started in Oct 2003 and the opposition case hearing was in June 2004. You may ask like I did, why did they not think of this right at the beginning? Why did it take a year, seven months, to come to this conclusion? So the two cases overlapped and in the opposition hearing a decision was made to look into these alleged assignments. So the next story is to tell you the outcome of that hearing.

Thursday 19 June 2008

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 10.

So all through 2001 I had had to put up with the antics of Chrysler in what seemed like an action that would go on forever. That was my now trying to force them to drop their appeal application. My Cobra Viper business had been spinning along. One year slow, one year good, but I was getting weary of the whole Kit Car scene. I had had 16 years of unremitting hard work, constant uncertainties, the frustration of being so close on two occasions to making it big time. Putting up with others in the industry who I would happily shoot on the spot, if only I could be guaranteed to be able to get away with it. What did the future  hold? The chance to at least get some money off Chrysler for the Mark had all but gone down the plughole thanks to Busbridge. One thing that made me happy, was that it was almost certain, neither would he get any pay out, if he had not got something already, which I doubt. The only thing I was determined to carry on doing, was to make sure he did not make any more money out of my trade name. However I was coming to the conclusion that life was more than beating your head against a brick wall all the time.

So really because of that, I decided that I was going to retire early. I would sell the business for what I could get. The last trading year had been good and a good buyer could build on that and I would help all I could. I would still own the trading name as I would just licence it out. So I sold my house and moved into a flat while I worked out what I would do and to get the business sold off. By the end of March, Chrysler were almost at the point of throwing the towel in at last. So I decided I would take a break in Spain to wind down. I still had my faithful Moke Replica and I decided to drive that down to the South Coast of Spain.
I got the ferry from Portsmouth to Bilbao and drove the 800 miles in one day arriving at my destination of Nerja just in time for a Chinese at around 8pm. I booked into the small family hotel I had used before, and had my meal. After I retired to my room and as I was trying to get off to sleep I started to feel very funny. First I thought it was just the meal, I got up and was deliberating whether I should get the landlord to call an ambulance, when it hit me. I was going into a heart attack. I knew what it was so got down on the floor, while an ambulance was called. The pain was crushing on my chest and the pains down my left arm. After what seemed an eternity the ambulance arrived and they got the necessary drugs into me and off to the local hospital.
I was in there for three weeks, for I had suffered what they said was a massive heart attack. To make things even worse after two days there I got appendicitis and they had to operate. I was told that I may not come through this operation, and I guess things were that bad because they called my two children to come to Spain. Luckily I must be made of harder stuff than they thought, as I pulled through. However after an event like that it certainly changes your perspective on life.
I can only believe that all this had been brought on by years of stress, and particularly the stress of the last two years. I was slim, always on my feet, loads of walking, cycling and I ate only the best foods for your body. No history in the family of heart attacks, and what was found was a blocked artery which they put a stent in. Of course you cannot prove it, but stress is known to do this, and it is true that even though I am not a person that shows stress, it could have been affecting me. Who knows?

So whilst I was recuperating in Spain, word got to me from the IPO that Chrsyler had thrown in the towel and my own registration was automatically going to be granted. It took effect from my application date of 1996. However this happiness was completely blocked by the next news from the IPO......They were allowing the application from Busbridge to also register the name. Can you believe this mob at the IPO?

I went apeshit at them and their excuse is that he put in his application to appeal Chrysler and register the Mark in his name and before me! To Hell with the fact that I had proved that I had used the Mark since 1986 long before Busbridge could prove any usage on his own and not as an agent of myself. To Hell with the fact that the business that applied for this registration, was no longer in operation as it was bankrupted. To Hell with the fact that the partnership that applied was also defunct. I was so mad I wrote a letter of complaint to the CEO of the IPO at that time, a woman as I recall, but whose name escapes me right now. The main point apart from stating the obvious points I have made above, that I made, was if they had listening to the many warnings that Busbridge was bankrupt as from 1993, this application of his should not not even be in existence. But was this really the IPO oly trying to make sure they got thier own back on me???

As with so many of the compaints that I made to the IPO over the years, they just ignored my complaint. The bitch never even replied but got one of her minions to send a letter which just ignored every point I had complained about. I kept banging away at them but in the end they in effect just told me to go away. Although when I at one stage posed a hypothetical question as to what they would do if they were told that an application to register a Mark, the applicant had gone bankrupt, they answered that if they knew this had happened they would contact the Receiver to see what he wanted to do. I had my answer, and from someone high up, but do you think it made the slightest bit of difference?........ not on your life! So I decided for future reference to trick them. I was so sure that I was right about this question of the bankruptcy especially now I had one answer on it. I contacted the department that dealt with the applications. I posed as another person completely and got them to answer the question in writing. I got the same answer.....it should have been made null and void!! Of course when I complained again to high ups in the IPO, they just ignored me again.

I decided to make an official complaint to the Parliamentary Ombudsman over their behaviour.I set out a thorough and comprehensive story of all the events, pointing out that what they had done was to deny me justice, lose me money, and their continual refusing to answer questions was against their own good ractice rules. That they had taken months to reply to letters and sometimes never answered at all etc etc. That my complaint to their CEO had effectively been ignored. That they had been guilty of maladministration. I saw my MP about it all and he told me very straight....."All Omsbudsmen are a waste of space and a con on the Public" How right he was for my complaint was rubbished by them and nothing I had said was found to be right. It was all a monumental waste of my time. They are there just to PROTECT their "incompetent civil servants", who are their bosses anyway.

By the way I had forgotten to tell you about Chrysler and the fact that when they backed out and gave in, they had to pay all most of my legal costs by my having to chase them to finalise. Plus they had to pay me the costs I was awarded when I won in my opposition to their rego app. So at least I wasn't out of pocket on that score. Wasn't in pocket either! But would you beleive these Yanky arseholes, they only continued to call their car in their dealer adverts and everywhere else.....THE CHRSYLER/DODGE VIPER. This prompted me to get a lawyer to threaten them with a big bill once again. They had to concede and I got my legal bill paid again. Not long after this they are at it again with asking me if I wanted to sell the Mark. But once again they never came up with a cent, all Yanky bullshit AGAIN.

About this time I went to the Press over this business of Chrysler, and my local paper did a front page with a photo of me and one of my Cobras and explaining the battle I was having with Chrysler. This appeared before I had retired and I thought it would be a good bit of publicity and I got more publicity when Auto Express took up the story too. Didn't make a scrap of difference though.

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 9.

Of course it came as no surprise to me that Chrysler had seen fit to send a solicitor to cover my trial. They would wouldn't they? Even in the months after they couldn't bring themselves to accept that they HAD FUCKING LOST IN 1998!! The total bastards.
They were saying to the High Court that even though I had been found not guilty, they (in effect) still thought that documents in that case would still have a bearing on their appeal ( against my registering the Viper name) You wouldn't believe it and it just ground on and on.
Eventually I had had enough of them and started to look at forcing their hand. They had spent all of 2000 pissing about with one time wasting effort with the Patent Office after another. Letters were flying about from their lawyers, Kings, me and the Patent Office. Yet the so called appeal, they still said they wanted to go ahead. The duplicitous Chrysler were also still peddling the offers to buy the name off me, but as with all their others offers it was just all Yanky piss, shit and wind. They just made me so mad.
Finally in 2001 I found a company in Guildford to take them on and force their hand. Either get on and appeal OR FUCK OFF!! I won't bore you with all the minutae of what was said, but after about nine months of more British snail-Justice grindings, it all came to an end. More on this later.
My application to register had long been on hold, as had Busbridges. On his application I thought it foregone conclusion that after I got rid of Chrysler, how on Earth could his go on??? OK he had put his application in a couple of years before me, thanks to Kings not doing what they said they would do, and getting mine in, in early 1992. However my case against Chrysler was granted because I had shown prior use to them and coincidently to his use. How wrong I was, once again.
Our wonderful crap Justice system just does not work on common sense and this extends to all the workings of the Patent Office. So beware all you people who think that their Intellectual Property is safe in their hands. They are guilty of stating a pack of lies when they advertise it is safe to register....whatever, with them. (You of course have to pay them to do this) I will deal with this at the end of this story in more detail.

Wednesday 18 June 2008

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 8.

Well after I had won this Chrysler decision, I was just so happy. For I couldn't see how Chrysler could have any grounds to appeal. Also it seemed to me that Busbridge would now be totally fucked up, as my registration had proved that I had used the Mark since 1986. How could the Patent Office now allow his application to register, go ahead. Well of course as with ALL BRITISH SO CALLED JUSTICE, COMMON SENSE DOES NOT EVEN COME INTO THINGS. WHAT A MAD FOOL I WAS TO THINK IT WOULD!!!!!

My joy did not last long as by May, Chrysler had formally started proceedings in the High Court to appeal the decision to award registration to me. This was typical of Chrysler as since the hearing they had been sending letters to Kings, trying to make out they wanted to buy the mark. Yet as always it never came to anything. Readers may not know, but my action was brought under the 1938 Trade Marks Act, which changed in 1994, but as my action had started well before 1994 it was done under the 1938 Act, and in that any appeal has to be heard in the ultra expensive British High Court. Something I could not afford at all, and Chrysler knew that.

 As it was, some time down the road it all fizzled out and whilst they did not withdraw their appeal, they just did nothing to further the process and this intolerable state of affairs continued until I forced their hand....more of that later on, as many other things now were going to happen and which I need to relate and comment on. Mostly they concerned the love of my life....Busbridge!!
All the time that Chrysler prevaricated and did nothing Busbridge was just going to carry on as usual. Using my Mark to sell a vehicle that was of my design. I couldn't do anything but wait.
Of course if I were rich I am sure I could have done something as there is always justice for the rich.

As I said already the forthcoming period of time brought me one headache after another, and the first one took place in January 1999. The Police arrived at my door and arrested me for forgery and perjury and perverting the course of justice. This action was instigated in November 1998 when Busbridge went to the Police in London, complaining I had submitted to the Patent Court, during the hearing with Chrysler, a forged agreement document saying it was the agreement between us re an agency. According, once again, to him I had forged this. Also they threw in for good measure another document I had put into evidence, that was an agreement setting out in 1986, who owned the intellectual rights of the chassis designs and the Trade Mark VIPER.

Now I would ask these questions:- I submitted the agency agreement to Chrysler and THEY submitted it into evidence. That was done back in 1992 and it was then that Busbridge said it was a forgery, so why did he not go to the Police then??? No it took him all the way to November 1998.....SIX YEARS LATER!! Also I find it very convenient for Chrysler that he should do that AFTER they had lost the hearing. It is my contention that they put him up to it because it would suit them well if they through him, could prove that that is what I actually did. Then they would have grounds to be able to fight the forthcoming appeal. So far, for over a year they had done noting......why??...... because they had no grounds for an appeal-you need to come up with new evidence or claim that the hearing you are wanting to appeal against was not heard corectly etc, etc. Indeed a little while later they submitted documents saying that the grounds for appealing were exactly that....that forged documents had been put into the hearing but the hearing officer had heard all that-so it wasn't a new accusation. However it had no relevance to whether I had used the Mark since 1986 and I won on those grounds. The grounds for the decision never even mentioned the agency agreement, but only all the documentary evidence of usage. Like copies of adverts and write ups in magazines etc.

Of course all this was serious as I have never had the slightest liking for British Police. After all they belong to the same club as all the other incompetent civil servants we should beware of. Why is is that we all suffer these days from ever soaring crime and the Police are totally constipated about it all. They cannot even respond to emergency calls these days. I had already had experience of my local Police on many a time and I was thoroughly disillusioned with them. This lot involved with this case would just carry on where their mates had left off with me when I had had traffic run ins with them, my complaints about thieves at my premises, and when I had to deal with trespassers into my property, when I had to physically deal with them , then I got charged for assault. So as far as I was concerned these flat foots were only interested in getting a "result" and not at getting to the truth.

I had to give a statement which I happily did and I outlined the truth of the matter and that it was just a pack of lies brought about by Busbridge to further his case. Do not forget that had I been found guilty I could have faced up to FOUR years inside, and now wouldn't that be nice for Chrysler and Busbridge? Chrysler would get their Mark registered and Busbridge would get an earner of some magnitude off them. So it was a worrying time as I knew that the Police were capable of anything, and so it would prove. Of course Busbridge knew no bounds as for lying and conniving and forging documents to bolster his case. What he did over the years in these departments defies understanding, as you will see. Quite why Chrysler wanted the Mark so desperately I have never been able to understand, as they only ever sold about 60 cars in the UK, and I can only assume that it was just because they were and are just nasty bastard YANKS, who never like to lose.

Of course because I was now a "criminal" I got solicitors to defend me, but like I said before on legal aid you get the dregs and indeed so did I. I was very fearful of losing because I could have done a better job at defending myself than they did as you will see. We had many disagreements and run ins over the way they conducted themselves. They didn't give a shit if I lost and got prison, as they would always get paid....win or lose.

The whole case rested on whether these two documents were forged. The first was a letter that my son and I who were both directors of BL, drew up to show any intending venture capital guys sniffing around that I owned he Intellectual Property and not the company. I signed as did my son. The Police said I had forged my sons signature. Well anybody with the slightest intelligence would be able to see that this was preposterous, we were working together and all I had to do was ask him to sign and he would act as a witness to that. ( They had to drop that one in Court when they saw he had turned up as a witness, but wait until you hear what the Police tried to do, later on in this story) So to the agreement:-
What Busbridge was saying was that I had made out the agreement after the date on it and had
lifted their signatures (Martins and Bobs) off another document, and had put them onto the bottom of the agreement document. This because they were exactly the same as on this other document. Trouble was this other document was not one I recognised and I said it looked like they had made that document up themselves and had done the lifting themselves. Do not forget that I only ever got back a photocopy of the agreement I sent them, so they could have done anything to it. Knowing what I knew by 1999 about Busbridge and his lies and character and knowing through Trevor Sangster Jones that they had been plotting against me in 1990, it is entirely feasible that they were going to do their dirty deeds way back when BRL went out of business. The original that I sent them was NEVER ever produced to the Police or to the Court. Quite how the Police and the Court thought they had a strong case against me, I will never know. But I did get a hint when the prosecution lawyer at the Court said he thought the case was very unusual and interesting. How nice for him and is that what made him decide it was a water tight case and if he won it would be another feather in his cap????? They make me sick these useless bastards running our so called JUSTICE system.

 So of course they had to go and find a nice compliant so called hand writing expert. They did this and guess what? He produced a load of nice waffle which said "of course it is forged" (in his opinion) He even said my son's signature was forged, which tickled my son no end.....but it wasn't funny. My solicitors had to refute this and to do this I thought that even a cretin would know that they should get a top expert, so what did they do? They got some amateur local woman who's hobby it was. I did some homework and quickly got to speak to someone in the know and I kicked up a hell of a fuss which endeared me to them no end. But Fuck em all! it was my liberty we were messing about with here. So I got on the net and found out the number one bunch of expert witnesses and I found the Head Honcho of that body. A Dutchman who had been in the UK a long time. I was Glad he was a Johnny foreigner because it meant he just may know what he was talking about. I sent him the "evidence" and he came back that in his opinion it was a joke. My solicitors did not like this at all.

They had taken on a barrister as all cases have to go through this anarchic procedure....jobs for the boys etc etc. We had a meeting and boy I did not like this bloke, especially when he started to talk like I was guilty and it was a case of how they were going to get round it. I tell you when I heard this toffee nosed twat talking like that I departed his office right quickly.
My big problem was the person supposed to be dealing with this case of mine was a woman who was not even a qualified solicitor. My case was being dealt with by a learner!! I complained to the head of that company but it got nowhere. They took on another guy from London to do the barrister bit, and I met him ONCE not long before the Court hearing so I was not impressed, but he didn't actually say I was guilty, which was one good thing. But I wasn't overjoyed.
Of course I wanted to show just what a liar Busbridge was and I expected the lawyers to do this too, but I was never sure how they were going to play it. I wanted to get Sangster Jones into the Court as my witness for obvious reasons. I made the big mistake of telling the Police about this guy, telling them he would be my best witness but the only problem was that he had disappeared from London and I could not trace him. In hindsight I was mad, and I would urge anyone who gets in the situation of having to give the Police statements, tell them nothing of importance and never trust the bastards. They are not interested in the truth....just getting a result and if that means stitching you up, so be it, your the sucker, they are the winners with Brownie points to there credit.

This was amply born out by what happened next with this finding of TSJ. They said "Oh don't worry we will find him wherever he is" Indeed they did trace him to Cornwall but did not tell me until after they had had a nice day out to go down there. Now whether they actually met him I will never really know for sure, but I think they did. After they kindly told me were it was he was found, I hot footed it down there. I had no address but knew the locality and knew it was small, so would be able to find him if he was still there. Indeed I traced the house he had rented and spoke to his landlady. He had gone some days before. I found from here where he had been working and went there and spoke with the owner of he premises he had rented. Guess what? He had mysteriously gone quite quickly, and I never was able to trace him.
Well what do you think happened? He had been found by the Police and been given a right frightening. "disappear son or we will do this etc etc" For all I know maybe he had got himself a record back in London and that is how it was easy for the Police to find him and threaten him.

The next thing the PC Plods do is take another nice long trip away from home. This time up to Liverpool where my son was living. Guess what, one of the plods is a Scouse Git, so he got to be able to have a nice weekend away with his family, friends and relatives in the Pool, and all for free. Now why did they go to the Pool to visit my Son???? He was my witness and they were out of order to even interview him. He could tell them to sod off, and that is exactly what I and my solicitor told him to do. The trouble with my son is that he has a big mouth and he thinks he can handle anything. However being young with no experience of the Police he just doesn't know how underhand and crafty they are. He let them into his house and then waffled away to them with a load of God knows what. Thankfully it seems that they did not get anything out of him that they could hope to use. But what it shows is that the Filth will try to bully you as they did him, even when legally they had no right to even question him, and he should even if he was willing to talk to them, have had a solicitor present.

My barrister would still not agree to having my and writing guy present at the Court on the day. He said he wanted to see how things would go and certainly have to see what their expert had to say. Trouble was you just cannot whistle up these guys just when you want, as they have other cases and this guy was in London. I was not happy about this given the importance of showing that the so called forgeries could have been done by anyone. Even if they were forgeries.

After about a year of waiting we at last got into Court at Dorchester for what they said would be a weeks trial. To keep it short I will be brief on the proceedings. Busbridge was cross examined and my barrister did a good job on that but in my opinion he was too soft on Busbridge as I felt he could have savaged him to death. Shown him up for all he was worth, so it was what I call a typical British go softly softly case. The so called expert wasn't brilliant either, and he had to admit that he could not be 100% sure of what had happened and that it could have done by Busbridge, so that was good.
I tried to be calm and clear and positive about all I said, and as I always wore a smart suit I think I came across as a credible witness. Unlike the pathetic Busbridge who was a slouch and looked it with scruffy clothes. I think he came across as a barrow boy type not to be trusted. Certainly he was tripped up endlessly on all his lies and stories. It came down in the end to who did the jury believe. My side was able to produce loads of credible documentary evidence that showed what Busbridge had been up to, pinching my business etc etc. So how could he be believed?

The Judge was a usual Brit type toffee nosed dickhead who waffled on and on, full of is own importance. I knew he did not like me because of some of the remarks he made to me when I was being cross examined. I think he thought I was being too smart for his liking, but I got my own back on him later. Marcus my Swiss agent agreed to come over as a witness, because Busbridge put in to evidence a document he said Marcus sent him, where he sold Busbridge the rights to the Viper name and the rights to the Cortina Viper. Of course no such thing happened and that document was just another one of Busbridges forgeries. Trouble was this Judge was making the trial last longer, and a day for Marcus to appear was proving difficult to pin down. In the end we were told by the Court that a certain should be OK, and Marcus came over, only for us to have the trial delayed again by this twat of a judge. So as Marcus could only stay a day, it was all a waste of time.

Later on I did manage to say to the Judge on this question of that document, that of course if he hadn't delayed the trial, I would have conclusively proven Busbridge was a liar and a forger. Of course the Judge waffled on about how that had to be struck out, but I knew that the jury was with me on that one at least. Shows you what farces British trials are as I could have been found guilty of murder, all for the want of one of my star witnesses not being accommodated by the bloody judge!!!

So after two long weeks it all came to a head and the jury retired for their verdict. Who were they going to believe? I felt I had shown I was not a liar and they could see who was. They were only out for half an hour which I was told was a good omen. So it was, I was found not guilty on all counts. Was I relieved to say the least and especially so when I thought back to the solicitors I had been forced to have to live with. Glory be to juries who save some of us from the iniquities of the British way of bumbling through even our justice system. But how many poor sods get done for things they never did??? How many die in jails innocent because we Brits couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery.
What was going to happen now to my battles with Busbridge??

Tuesday 17 June 2008

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 7.

It should be told here that from my return from Germany back in September 1992 I had eventually got back into making my Viper Cobra kit in the UK even though I knew that I would be facing competition from Busbridge and his direct copy that he was selling. This meant that it was impossible for me to get back to the heights of the old BRL business because every car/kit he sold was one I lost out to.
I could take no legal action against him because until my case against Chrysler was finished I only owned the Mark under Common Law and that meant it was too difficult for me to take legal action to stop Busbridge-I had to wait until the Chrysler case was finished and won. Very frustrating and it completely stopped me from ever being able to build up my business again, as you will see. I was able eventually and by the end of 1995 to at least make a small living at it. I just had to wait until that Chrysler hearing in 1998.

About early 1993 started a copyright action against Busbridge.In copying my chassis he broke copyright laws. In those days you could still get Legal Aid for such matters. Now you have to only be a criminal and your covered. Wonderful World we live in, this Great Britain. Great Farce if you ask me!! Anyway the action kicked off and my solicitor soon asked me to approach Cyril Malem the bloke who had worked with me to get the Jag chassis designed. I called on him and he immediately went off into a tirade about how he had lost money on the making of the jigs etc and also when I moved the work off to someone else. It seems it completely escaped him as to why that happened. Anyway it was now blackmail time. Give me £500 and I will sign a statement confirming what work I did. I also asked him to provide me with the name and address of the old geezer who had drawn up the drawing of the chassis with all the measurements, as the copyright was in this drawing. I paid the £500 and he signed a statement that had been made up by my solicitor, but in the end I never got the address of the draughtsman. It never ceases to amaze me how many low lives there are in the UK.

It was all for nothing as later on my solicitor in 1996 told me that as EU laws said that you got only 10 years copyright protection and as it was now 10 years since the chassis was designed, end of story! Well I do not know if he was telling the truth, but by then after three years of snail like progress and him being a useless wimp, I had had enough of this action. Trouble is with legal aid (or was) is that it only attracts the third rate lawyers. I could not afford to take on shit hot lawyers so was having to put up with someone who was obviously only milking the legal aid. So it came to an end.

One other event happened during this time which was of enormous significance to my whole case and argument about civil servants and their incompetence. In 1993 Busbridge went bankrupt and this should have changed things for the best. But not on your life as things are so crappily run in the UK that nothing ever goes right. I spoke with Kings about this bankruptcy as it should have had certain ramifications over the Busbridge application to also register Viper.
Firstly the application had been made in the name of R & M Busbridge Trading as Cobretti Engieneering. Both were now defunct and bankrupt so it should have meant that the application was now null and void. The application is an asset and that should automatically have belonged now to the Receiver. Kings agreed and said he would notify the Patent Office.

Of course Busbridge just carried on trading as if nothing had happened. Same product, same premises. same assets etc etc. Just a name change to Autotrak Ltd. Much later I was to learn more of all the slimy things Busbridge did to protect his arse, but one thing I know he did do and that was to, some months before the bankruptcy move all the Cobretti Engineering assets into this new company. I will comment further and in depth on this and future criminal acts.

Later on in this period I rang the Patent Office over something to do with the evidence that Busbridge had put into the Chrysler evidence. I asked how they could allow evidence from a bankrupt? From what they told me they said they had no idea he was a bankrupt. I wrote them on the subject as did Kings, and over the years right up to the current date, I have banged on about this fact. This being:- THE PATENT OFFICE HAVE KNOWN BECAUSE THEY WERE TOLD MANY TIMES THAT BUSBRIDGE WAS A BANKRUPT AND THAT THE PARTNERSHIP HAD BROKEN UP AND THEREFORE THAT THEIR APPLICATION HAD TO BE NULL AND VOID. EVERY TIME THEY JUST IGNORED EVERYTHING I SAID AND TO THIS DAY I HAVE NEVER BEEN GIVEN ANY EXPLANATION WHY THIS WAS.

Of course we all know that useless incompetent civil servants NEVER admit to mistakes. But this mistake has cost me dearly, and you will see over time just how. I will return to this and many other examples of their total and complete uselessness and this blog is not one so that I can revel in my history and involvement with a sexy product, but one where I want to bring it to the attention of the Public yet another example of how the Great British Public get treated in this country of ours. How in the case of Intellectual Property everything to do with the Patent Office looks like a scam to me. Certainly when it comes to Trade Marks it seems to me that people just do not get protection. Again more on this later. In the meantime there is loads to tell you as it is far from all over, and I am now at the point where I get into Court over my challenge to Chrysler.

Monday 16 June 2008

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 6.

As I have already mentioned, the hearing for me to at long last oppose the Registration of the Mark VIPER had been made for Feb 1998, some six years after I started proceedings. This in itself is a bloody disgrace and not a good advertisement for ever using this useless body of incompetent civil servants who grandly call themselves, The Patent Office. The only thing patent about them, is that they are patently useless. If they call this JUSTICE then I call them a lot of ignorant twats. For if your a small business who are being ripped off of your Intellectual Property by some low lives, who are making money off your back, then SIX YEARS IS A LIFETIME AND IN THAT TIME YOU CAN BE DECIMATED AND OUT OF BUSINESS...FULL STOP!!!!!!!

The hearing took place in a building in the city of London which was vaguely like a Court. However these kind of proceedings are not conducted in the same way as a full blown High Court case. Thank God for that, because if they had, that would have been yet another imposition. Even so the Hearing Officer as he was called did come over as a typical pompous upper class twit. As did the really over bearing and even more pompous legal twat employed by Chrysler. But then they could afford the best of the pompous and full of themselves and he was called Mr Morcom. ( sounds like a character out of Dickens).

I will not go into every thing that was said and every argument made as that would make this discourse too long and boring the the reader. Suffice it to say that Morcom waffled on and on about the same subject, ad infinitum. Basically he just tried to bang on about the lies that Busbridge had told them about how they owned the Mark and I had never owned it, and how I had forged this agency document. He got me in the witness stand and tried his best to get me to admit it was a forgery. Just what this had to do with the legitimacy of the application by Chrysler, I fail to see. They filed it on Jan 12 1990, and anything that applies to before that date, is irrelevant. In anycase the agency document had not been put into my evidence against Chrsyler, because I had merely sent it to them to show them that Busbridge was lying when he said he had made Vipers since 1988. They went on then to admit it into evidence, as proof that I was a liar and a forger.
I refused to admit to anything and refused to offer any explanation as to their assertions that it was a forgery and how they came to that conclusion. I told them that as far a I was concerned, I sent an agency agreement document asking them to sign it and send a copy back. When I got the signed copy back I filed it without further thought, end of story. If it had been any type of forgery then it had to be one that they had made. Chryslers Mr Morcom made no comments on any of the documentary evidence that I had supplied, backing up my claim that I had thought of the Mark back in 1986 and had used it copiously since. That I had owned it and not any of the two companies I ran. BL and BRL.
So when MR King was able to have his say, he stressed all this overwhelming evidence that showed my connection with the Mark and he commented on many of the documents showing this. He showed up their attempts at denigrating me and asked why they had shown not one jot of evidence that they had used the name prior to 1990 or were even at selling such a named vehicle at Jan 1990 or for some time after.
The hearing did not last for that long, say for at the most and hour and a half. I was on tenterhooks for months after as to how it would go, as in such cases in this country you can never tell how some dotty Judge or Magistrate or whoever, is going to see it. One sees so many bizarre judgements that I for one have no faith in British justice, British judiciary or anything else to do with Courts.

THE DECISION.
This came in March 1998, quicker than I thought it would be. A lot of legal waffle is in it, but what it broke down to was that the Hearing Officer on the evidence shown by me came to the conculson that I had proved prior usage and on the face of it I had the strongest claim to the Mark. So he found for me and Chrysler lost out. Oh how that must have stung those cocky Yanks and their pompous legal farts, that crook of a thief Busbridge must have been spitting bricks. Gone were his chances of geting a big payout.
Talking about payouts those Yanky bastards made an off the day we were to go into the Court, of £5,000 for me to drop my oppositon. My bloody legal bill was for much more than this. Then after the decision they had another go saying that they were still considering doing a deal with me. Of course it was all Yanky bullshit and they never made any deal then or at anytime in the future, as you will see.

Intellectual Property Office-How they aided a crook. 5.

My agent Kings was moving very slowly, but the problem was the Patent Office, their slow ways, their slow system, and for some queer reason Chrysler who didn't seem that concerned to get a quick resolution. I can only think that it did not make any difference to them if it took a year, two years or five years before they resolved if they could register the Trade Mark VIPER. For in the meantime they could just merrily carry on using it, which is exactly what they did.

I, as the person with the legal right to it, could do nothing to stop them using it as at that time I did not own it on paper, and similarly with Busbridge, I could not stop him either. So from the end of 1991 here he was merrily advertising Vipers and doing me out of profits with every sale he made of kits and the occasional car.

Chrysler were thick as thieves with Busbridge and they were saying that they would go ahead with their application to register and would use Busbridge as their witness to their belief that I did not own it. I felt that the Patent Office were bending over backwards for Chrysler at every turn, and they were no doubt scared of the big time lawyers that Chrsler could use to make all their arguments. Certainly Chrysler seemed to use every trick in the book to prevaricate, and
to ask endlessly for extensions of time, which they were always given.

The fight with Chrysler took SIX YEARS, with the final hearing date in February 1998, and my legal action in opposing Chryslers Registration started in February 1992. I will not bore the reader with an in depth and blow by blow account of everything that went on and was said. Mainly because this is irrelevant to my main fight with the thief Busbridge. Only to say once more that the inordinate time it took was as I have said, down to the slowness of the Patent Office over everything they did, and Chrysler doing their best to slow things. However one thing I ought to mention is that Chrysler did start to ask if I wanted to sell the Mark. At first they offered a paltry sum of around £30,000 and later on they upped this to around over double that at £66,000. I told Kings to accept this, but after doing so true to what Yanks are about, we heard no more.

Chryslers so called evidence all hung on them trying to prove that I had abandoned the name at the cessation of business of BRL in September 1989. In fact ALL their evidence was merely of compilation of copies of advertising by Busbridge from that date onwards. By now they had stopped trying to say they manufactured the VIPER from as far back as 1988. They also made statement in which they accused me of forging the agency agreement between me and them dated in September 1989. They accused me of never having owned the Mark and in anycase of abandoning it when BRL closed. Of course they conveniently ignored that from September 1989 they had been my agents and had sold the VIPER for me and that their early adverts when I was still around and before my going to Winterthur, which specifically said that the sale of the VIPERS was "Now under new management" which does not mean under new "OWNERSHIP" So I went into this hearing feeling Quite confident.

I must mention that Busbridge in the early days did two things. Firstly he too put in an opposition to Chryslers Registration, but as he was allying himself with them anyway, he let this slide away. Also in late 1992 he also applied to register the Mark himself. In this he jumped in before me as I had instructed my agent Kings to put in a registration for me in early Feb 1992, and even paid him the fee to do it. Inexplicably he never did do so, and his excuse was that it was not that important as If I won against Chrysler his application was irrelevant as I had prior use to him, as with Chrysler. This made good sense to me and I accepted that, but you will see that this was either a monumental blunder, or the Patent Office made a blunder by not taking this fact ever into consideration, as you will see later on.