Comments can be sent to us at irnist23@gmail.com

INTRODUCTION
This Blog is dedicated to making public some of the business activities and methods of Liam Collins, David Bone Jr and their associates. In the spring of 2010, the present authors invested in Collins & Bone (C&B), who were offering an enticing 8-10% interest on the basis of buying houses for cash, renovating them and letting them out to students. We were assured that our money was secured against houses that they owned, including their own homes and the properties held by their associated company, Castle & Gatehouse (C&G). We have emails and brochures that confirm these details, as do others who invested on this same basis at around the same time. The idea worked for us for over a year, then in November 2011 they told us they were insolvent. They refused our every request for clear accounts, which led us to suspect wrongdoing. We began an investigation and then started this Blog. We found our suspicions confirmed: other investors had lost sometimes quite large amounts to C&B and its predecessor CBS, and all requests for repayment were adamantly refused. These people use and have used so many names that we found it necessary to compress them into CoBo (for Collins & Bone) and Coboco (for the whole bunch of them – there are quite a few!) Note that there is an index in the margin at the right hand side.

Saturday, 28 January 2012

SHEER VERBOSITY STUPEFIES THE UNWARY

On the Collinsbone blog are published their very verbose responses to the questions put to C&B by the Financial Times. 

Readers are free to observe in those answers a tried-and-tested sales and self-defence technique: draw them in, then talk them into stupefaction. This trick of mere verbosity is now to be deployed in efforts to evade responsibility for false promises made to C&B investors. The promises were made in order to obtain money from them. We remind readers that we invested money on the basis that the cash would be used for buying houses. There appears to be no evidence that houses were in fact bought, even though C&B amassed more than a million pounds in 2010. 

We advise investors not to be baffled by the chaotic stream-of-consciousness defence used in the Collinsbone blog; the sensible, energy-saving course is simply to dismiss  it. Investors should instead consider making statements about their own experiences with C&B, so that  the documented facts about their business dealings and track record can be collated. It is these that will be of interest to forensic accountancy.

It remains to be seen for just how long the relevant authorities will be willing to put up with such a barrage of self-justification, before realising that it will have to be stopped in its tracks. Then the case will be calmly judged according to demonstrable fact and dealt with accordingly.

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NB  Readers, please note that the Financial Times was contacted by an investor other than ourselves and we still don't know who that investor is. Also, the term 'witch hunt' is used in the copycat blog to describe this Blog. If antiquated terms are going to be used, then 'treasure hunt' would be more accurate; i.e., what have they done with all the money?

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