JUSTICE CLOSES IN ON COLLINS AND BONE

Today the Insolvency Service posted the following Press Release on its website:

Britain's Got Talent dancer and business partner get 28-year bankruptcy restrictions for investment scam

Britain’s Got Talent semi-finalist Liam James Collins, and his business partner and fellow street dancer David Bone, have each received 14-year bankruptcy restrictions for misleading people into investing in a property scheme that never materialised.

The restrictions, which also disqualify them from being directors, started on 25 July 2013, following an investigation by the Insolvency Service.

Mr Collins and Mr Bone gave the bankruptcy restrictions undertakings to the Secretary of State for Business, Innovations and Skills, following earlier bankruptcy orders made on 9 May 2012 and 31 May 2012 respectively. They each owed over £4.5 million to creditors.

Investigators found that from January 2010 to April 2011, Mr Collins (34) of Covent Garden, London, who danced on the TV show as one half of the act “Faces of Disco” and his cousin, David Bone (31) of Middleton, Greater Manchester, took £874,000 from investors promising returns of between eight and ten percent, but instead used the funds to pay business expenses.

At the time, the two dancers already owed over £3 million to creditors following the failure of a similar property business. Between November 2010 and April 2011, they also took a further £187,500 from the public despite being warned not to do so by the Financial Conduct Authority.

Mr Collins and Mr Bone failed to carry out any of the investment activity that investors would have reasonably expected them to do. When investors sought explanations they were misled and the true state of the partnerships finances were kept from them.

Commenting on the case, Ken Beasley of the Insolvency Service’s Public Interest Unit said:

“At a time when they were already heavily indebted Collins and Bone took substantial sums of money from members of the public with the promise of high returns on property investments with no reasonable expectation that they would ever be able to meet the repayments promised to investors."

"The Insolvency Service investigates the circumstances of all bankruptcies and will use its enforcement powers to tackle serious misconduct of this kind.”

Contact Information.  Media Enquiries should be directed to Kathryn Montague – Media Relations Manager – 020 7674 6910 or Ade Daramy, Press Officer - 020 76596 6187.

OUR AIM AND HOW THINGS STAND REGARDING COLLINS AND BONE

Our aim, from the start of this Blog, as most readers know, has been to clarify the accounts of Collins and Bone and their associates (Coboco) and to find out what happened to the investors’ money. We had to ensure that the two persons in the forefront of this case, the perpetrators Liam Collins and David Bone Jr, were bankrupted in order that scrutiny of their financial accounts could commence.

The analysis of those accounts is the job of the Public Trustee (PT). In this case, Messrs Chantrey Vellacott were nominated when their agent, Mr David Clements, was working for them and was in touch with us. Since he left the firm, Chantrey Vellacott does not seem to have considered it any kind of priority to communicate with Collins and Bone's creditors. Professional people these days do charge very high fees and consequently the Public Trustee feels that it would be too costly to scrutinize all of the said accounts in detail; witness that Chantrey Vellacott, having scarcely scratched the surface of the said accounts, have already managed to rack up a bill of £40,000 plus VAT—and that doesn’t take account of their lawyer! We realise that the cost of maintaining offices in Russell Square and elsewhere must be exorbitant,* but that can’t be a problem to dump on CoBo’s creditors, can it? Nor is it fair to plunder the sole (at present) discoverable asset pertaining to Collins & Bone, namely, the property at 25 Shelton Street, London. ‘Trustee’ means someone who is to be trusted, but it doesn’t mean someone who can be trusted to get as much out of a situation for themselves without the slightest regard to the other people and other factors involved.

The Trustees, Chantrey Vellacott, have called a creditors’ meeting in order to approve their charges and they have offered to host this meeting at the nominal charge of £100 plus VAT for the use of one of their rooms for this purpose. They have not stated whether this fee would include refreshments, sandwiches, etc. There can be no doubt that this would present an absurd situation for CoBo’s creditors. Something more equitable will have to be worked out, as well as something more reasonable by way of fees. 

No wonder British business is in a parlous state! We warn that with this sort of grab-and-snatch attitude, everyone will eventually lose out.

Meanwhile, evidence is surfacing that David Bone Sr and Mark Black benefited substantially from money that investors entrusted to Collins & Bone and to CBS. In fact, they were able to draw on those funds at will, without any proper checks. ('Those funds' = money paid to them in good faith by many readers of this Blog, as well as ourselves).

We call upon all those involved in this case to pull their socks up and help us shovel away this sorry mess. You are invited to rise up from your sofas.

* Mr Clements was based in Reading, where it is logical to suppose that overheads are considerably less overheated than they are in central London.

LIAM COLLINS ADMITS MISCONDUCT IN BRU

Liam Collins has signed a Bankruptcy Restriction Undertaking (BRU) for the maximum period less one year, that is, for 14 years. He has admitted the Official Receiver's findings of misconduct as detailed in the following extract:

"Between 5 November 2010 and 29 April 2011, Liam James Collins (“Mr Collins”) continued to accept investments from members of the public by way of promissory notes totalling £187,500 in contravention of the Financial Services Marketing Act 2000 (FSMA) and despite being explicitly requested to cease doing so by the Financial Services Authority (FSA). Mr Collins also failed to notify existing investors of their statutory rights under the FSMA as required by the FSA on 26 October 2010.

"Between January 2010 and April 2011, whilst trading in partnership with David Bone as property investment, lettings and renovation, although not personally responsible for financial transactions, Mr Collins allowed the misappropriation of investor monies totalling at least £874,000. In particular:

"At January 2010, the Collins and Bone partnership (“C&B”) had existing liabilities under promissory notes totalling £3,047,845, given to investors in a group of companies that had gone into liquidation on 18 December 2009, and of which David Bone and Mr Collins were directors.

"From January 2010, Mr Collins made misleading representations to members of the public to induce further investments in C&B.

"Between January 2010 and April 2011 further investments totalling at least £874,000 by way of Promissory Note were accepted by C&B. Mr Collins was indirectly involved in several Joint Venture Agreements and he believed that the future revenue streams of those agreements had the potential to repay investors. As C&B were not formally party to those agreements C&B investors had no legal entitlement to any potential funds arising from, or legal recourse against the third parties contracted to, those Joint Venture Agreements.

"Between January 2010 and April 2011 C&B did not undertake any business activity relating to that which the investors would have reasonably expected their investments to have been applied given the representations of C&B.

"Between January 2010 and September 2011, in providing explanations for the delay in payments properly due to investors from C&B under the terms of Promissory Notes issued, Mr Collins provided inaccurate information concerning the valuation of assets held by the partnership,  the estimate of expected income receipts from third party ventures and the likelihood that investors would receive payments due in the future."  

As far as we know, no-one is in possession of the facts relating to what exactly happened to the £3 million plus which the partners took from CBS investors. They certainly misused the £1 million approx. which they had extracted by means of false promises from C&B investors in 2010. We are not aware of their having shown any sign of remorse, but we would point out that the way is always open for them to start seriously co-operating with the investigation, regardless of the embarrassment this would entail for them. The partners need to 'come clean' before being able to make sincere efforts to 'go straight' in future.

It seems that Liam Collins may have misled his family and close associates with business fantasies that took little account of legality, but that does not absolve those people of complicity.

DAVID BONE JR - THE OR's FINDINGS OF MISCONDUCT

We received today a copy of David Bone Jr's BRU (Bankruptcy Restriction Undertaking) from the Official Receiver. Liam Collins's BRU will follow in a few days. Following below is an extract from the above mentioned document. (Note that David Bone Jr has put his signature to all of these findings).

"The matters of misconduct admitted were:

"Between 5 November 2010 and 29 April 2011, David Bone (“Mr Bone”) continued to accept investments from members of the public by way of promissory notes totalling £187,500 in contravention of the Financial Services Marketing Act 2000 (FSMA) and despite being explicitly requested to cease doing so by the Financial Services Authority (FSA). Mr Bone also failed to notify existing investors of their statutory rights under the FSMA as required by the FSA on 26 October 2010.

"Between January 2010 and April 2011, whilst trading in partnership with Liam Collins as property investment, lettings and renovation, Mr Bone caused the misappropriation of investor monies totalling at least £874,000. In particular:

"At January 2010, the Collins and Bone partnership (“C&B”) had existing liabilities under promissory notes totalling £3,047,845, given to investors in a group of companies that had gone into liquidation on 18 December 2009, and of which Liam Collins and Mr Bone were directors. 

"From January 2010, although not personally responsible for sales, Mr Bone allowed misleading representations to be made to members of the public to induce further investments in C&B.

"Between January 2010 and April 2011 further investments totalling at least £874,000 by way of Promissory Note were accepted by C&B. Mr Bone was indirectly involved in several Joint Venture Agreements and he believed that the future revenue streams of those agreements had the potential to repay investors as C&B were not formally party to those agreements C&B investors had no legal entitlement to any potential funds arising from, or legal recourse against the third parties contracted to, those Joint Venture Agreements. 

"Between January 2010 and April 2011 C&B, did not undertake any business activity relating to that which the investors would have reasonably expected their investments to have been applied given the representations of C&B.

"Between January 2010 and September 2011, although not personally responsible for investor communications, in providing explanations for the delay in payments properly due to investors from C&B under the terms of Promissory Notes issued, Mr Bone allowed Liam Collins to provide inaccurate information concerning the valuation of assets held by the partnership,  the estimate of expected income receipts from third party ventures and the likelihood that investors would receive payments due in the future."

NB  The areas of misconduct by the partners refer to C&B investors from January 2010. The matter of the bona fide CBS investors, on the other hand, who have seen more than £3 million disappear so far without trace has yet to be properly investigated.

COLLINS & BONE - A FOURTEEN YEAR BANKRUPTCY RESTRICTION FOR BOTH PARTNERS

Readers will appreciate that confidentiality has prevented us from keeping them as bang up to date with developments as we would wish, but we are able to report the following:

Liam Collins and David Bone Jr have finally had to accept a Bankruptcy Restriction Undertaking (BRU) for fourteen years each. This is just one year short of the maximum restriction that the Secretary of State can impose. 

The partners have had to accept the findings of the Official Receiver and his allegations in their case. A report of these findings will be issued to creditors as well as a Press notice. Details of the restrictions and the partners' misconduct may also be published on the Insolvency Services website.

CoBo did not make it easy for the Court or the Official Receiver: they did their best, as usual, to delay matters and quibble over many points. David Bone Jr only agreed to a BRU on the day of his court hearing, so the OR's representative, his assistant and one of our investors travelled to the Court only to be told that the case had been superseded.

The partners have wasted the time of many officials in their attempts to wriggle out of responsibility for the wide-spread mess they have created.

As soon as we have a copy of the OR's findings we shall publish them here.

To conclude, we make the critical point that we still have no idea whatsoever as to what CoBo did with the money they raked in. We suspect that much of it may have gone into now concealed assets, some of them perhaps abroad.

Sometimes a jail sentence is the only way to drive home the fact that dishonest business will meet with society's firm disapproval.

COURT HEARING FOR COLLINS AND BONE - NEWS FROM THE OFFICIAL RECEIVER

Following are two announcements from the Official Receiver:-

 
"The Official Receiver issued an application for a Bankruptcy Restriction Order in the bankruptcy proceedings of Liam James Collins (Newcastle County Court No. 1517 of 2011) on 3 May 2013. The first hearing of the application is scheduled to be heard on 25 July 2013." 

"The Official Receiver issued an application for a Bankruptcy Restriction Order in the bankruptcy proceedings of David Bone (Wigan County Court No. 100 of 2012) on 24 May 2013. The first hearing of the application is scheduled to be heard on 1  August 2013."

Here is the Government's Insolvency Service definition of a Bankruptcy Restrictions Order (BRO):-

"If the official receiver considers that a bankrupt has acted dishonestly, or is blameworthy in some other way, they will report the facts to court and ask it to make a BRO. The court will consider this report and any other evidence put before it, and will decide whether it should make a BRO. If it does, the individual will be subject to certain restrictions for the period stated in the order. This can be from 2 to 15 years."

What are the restrictions?

"The restrictions are wide ranging. They include the restrictions set out in insolvency law to which an individual is subject when they are made bankrupt and which are normally lifted when they are discharged from bankruptcy. 

These restrictions include the following:

• An individual must disclose their status as a person subject to bankruptcy restrictions to a credit provider if they wish to get credit of £500 or more.

•  If they carry on business in a different name from the name in which they were made bankrupt, they must disclose to those with whom they wish to do business the name (or trading style) under which they were made bankrupt.

• They may not act as the director of a company or take part in its promotion, formation or management unless they apply to the court for permission to do so.

• They may not act as an insolvency practitioner, or as the receiver or manager of the property of a company on behalf of debenture holders.

• They may not be a Member of Parliament in England or Wales.

It would be a criminal offence not to comply with any of the first four restrictions above."

THE COLLINS & BONE ROADSHOW

We have been sent a collection of videos showing CoBo doing their street act, which they call FACES OF DISCO. In the video to which we provide a link below, readers will notice how eager the unsuspecting watchers are to come up and put their money in CoBo's coffers, which appear as floppy top hats each with a Union Jack emblazoned on it. That gives the impression that the money being collected is for some selfless purpose or other, but not of course for the purpose of starting to pay off their huge debts. We can only imagine that the Police and the Taxman are standing by in the crowd, enjoying the show. Have they heard the pair boast, we wonder, that they can make £1,000 a day from this street act? Another plus for Corrupt Britain. This should get the BBC to prick their ears up!

http://youtu.be/fSEyQhc3sqE 

THE ESSENTIALS OF THE CASE: A RECAPITULATIION

It may be of interest to all concerned to have a recapitulation of the critical points in the Coboco case, viz:

1. The Accounts. Investors and creditors still do not know what Coboco did with the money they took on the understanding that they were going to buy and renovate houses. We are not talking about small sums here, but millions of pounds. This is a very serious matter which Liam Collins has dismissed with the terse statement, "The money is spent." He now appears to think that he should be free simply to forget all of that and just get on with his new scheme for tax-free earnings.

2. Trust. Society and business in general rely to a great extent on trust; in fact, business would not be possible without trust. In the case of Coboco, they dishonoured the trust that had been vested in them. Their dishonesty has given an awful lot of work to many people in trying to sort out their mess. It has also caused real hardship to many bona fide investors. All this will eventually come out into the open.

3.  Starting Out With A Clean Slate. This will not be an option for Coboco until they see the wisdom of fully co-operating with the authorities and those they have deceived, to clear up that murky background of theirs. Unless they come clean, they will find that their past will not only continue to haunt them, but will inexorably catch up with them and bring them to book. As we have noted before, the partners are apparently able to argue their way into and out of almost anything, but all that does is to merely postpone the reckoning. This Blog will be following the case all the way through to ensure final fair play. Come clean now, we say to Coboco, and save everyone further trouble in having to deal with you and yours!

LIAM COLLINS IN CHARACTER

The following post is offered mainly for readers who are interested in noting the psychological and social science aspects of the Coboco case. Interpersonal relationships and friendships in the sphere of the performing arts have of course always been famously dramatic and no exception are the two letters we publish unedited herebelow, which are from Liam Collins to Andrea Nova. They are Liam Collins's response to Andrea's to us, which we published as the previous post on this blog. 

1. "Hey Andre nice try with the blogging. I will be listing the contract for all to see tomorrow as well as all evidence of emails to show the tv heads was my idea and I do not owe a mask man 800 pounds. so I now have you for libel too. Ha you're so unintelligent it makes me laugh those bloggers will not take down your statement and its lies as you know it. I could afford to sue you now but the longer I wait the more I get you for.

"you are one greasy balding man. think ill check out flight prices to Trieste I've heard it's nice this time of year.

2. "I take great pleasure in knowing that I have you the best thing you will ever be. Like I said to you all people care about are the masks. You were so sure that you hated the masks and that they were nothing special but now you understand that it's all people care about. Every time you put a mask on I want you to understand that you're paying great respect to the person who invented it. Me. So thank you. People in Trieste in your home town already know you're a fraud. I have only started. I was going to leave it there but clearly you want to make this into something more like a war so lets go. I will have fun seeing you try to convince the public that a) you signed no contract ha what a joke and b) Alex invented TV heads! You are such a greasy lyre and the people of Italy need to know about the man behind the mask. The man who thinks he is above the law, who pays no races, launders money, steals acts. Even the Italian translated said to us "I am sorry for you, the last thing Italy needs is another fraud."

"you sure you want to play these games Andre? I offered to do this friendly but you've ignored me.

"Remember you got paid for every dance you did. You were never deceived once. you went behind my back and to say you only found out about the blog is another lie I told you all about it when I met you. I was open and honest with you. It is you Andre who is deceitful it is you who will be shamed in public. I will not stop until I do to you what the bloggers have done to me. Going to them is fine it simply gives me more evidence for my lawyer.

"Sleep well. You're a loser Andre I knew that when I first met you. You looked like a middle aged man in a baseball cap and my guy told me this guys a loser I should have acted on it.

"For the record your swipes are absolute horse shit, your rhythm is awful. Your moves are at best weak and average. Your crazy rat is heavy footed and lethargic and your teeth look like a witch doctors necklace. You played the goon character because you're one ugly bloke with fungus skin and a shining scalp.

"If you're going to lie at least make them entertaining I look forward to the next blog post.

"I think ill start my own andrea nova YouTube page. I have so many videos and photos. Yes I think I will. Why not you seem perfectly fine lying about me."

Editors: We really don't know whether Andrea actually signed some sort of contract with Liam Collins or not. Liam Collins has told us that he has such a contract and will let us have a copy on Monday next, as he is away. However, in the meantime we must ask: just how many contracts has he himself broken? How many County Court Judgments were issued against him and his partner, and ignored? These contracts were for quite large sums of money, mind, not for a stage act involving photographic paper masks and the music of other artists.

LIAM COLLINS - A CHARACTER REFERENCE FROM ITALY

This message has been sent to us from Italy by Andrea Nova, the man who partnered Liam Collins to reach the finals in the TV show Italia’s Got Talent.

“I am a professional dancer and used to run a dance school in Italy. I came to London last year to do something new and I encountered the worst person I have ever met in my life - Liam Collins. In May 2012 I began performing Faces of Disco (FOD) in the street with him.

“Problem: Collins and his girlfriend Beata Jambor, have been writing malicious stories about me to everyone I know in Italy, including the press, my agent and teenagers picked at random on Facebook, alleging that I am a fraudster, have broken a contract with him and have 'stolen Faces of Disco'. But at no time did I sign any contract with Collins or FOD. Further, dancing with a mask cannot in itself be subject to copyright. People have done it for many centuries.

“Partnering Collins in dance shows, I soon realized that he was not a well-balanced person and as an Italian, I was shocked by the rough way he treated people. I had already entered Italia’s Got Talent (IGT) with Collins before I came upon your Blog and there discovered the extent of his bankruptcy and the way he had consistently deceived his investors. I thought it would be best to dissolve our FOD partnership there and then, but everyone I knew in Italy, including my solicitor, advised me not to lose such an opportunity but to stick with Collins until the show finished.

“As it was, continuing with Collins turned out to be a big mistake. My brother Alex, who works in television, gave us a new idea for the FOD act: instead of masks we could use live TV screens. He provided the technology at a cost of £1,000 and gave of his time without charge. Collins agreed FOD would pay this sum but in the end, he paid less than half.  He is now sending out malicious messages about Alex, because he has danced wearing a mask with me. Collins has written that he wants to bury us both. He also threatened to break my leg. When IGT was over, Collins and I went our separate ways and I did not contact him again.

"Many people in Italy watched IGT and now, when I do a performance, they always want me to do a piece from that show, wearing a mask. I did a lot of work on the IGT competition over a five month period, working on the choreography and the music scores and I'm not keen to just throw it all away. Much of it was my work because Collins is not a professional dancer and doesn’t know many moves.

“Collins is writing foul-mouthed, abusive messages to me and threatening to come to Italy to sort things out. I fail to understand his aggressive behaviour and how he can destroy eveyone’s trust —for example, owing £800 to the man who made the masks for FOD.

"I would like to warn everyone to stay well away from Liam Collins and his associates. His utter dishonesty and habit of lying should be evident to many by now, as he tries to muscle his way through life with a cynical disregard for others. This needs to have all the publicity it can get. Thank you."