Court Summons Received - ignored all previous letters - what now?

nosferatu1001

there is an "or" there
That "or" is important. they dont HAVE to make an appliction to the court (to not pay the £25 fee, or to delay it in some way)

MiguelCotto

I've received a big bunch of defence paperwork from CEL - Photos of the car park etc & some copies of other cases - looks like a big case file. It might be for the purposes of intimidation. They say that a legal representative will be at the hearing and not 'Scott Wilson' who was the name on all the previous documentation.

Is there a quick (online) way of finding out if the case has been struck out? I may need to start preparing my defence for end of Feb. Thanks in advance.

beamerguy

MiguelCotto wrote: »

I've received a big bunch of defence paperwork from CEL - Photos of the car park etc & some copies of other cases - looks like a big case file. It might be for the purposes of intimidation. They say that a legal representative will be at the hearing and not 'Scott Wilson' who was the name on all the previous documentation.

Is there a quick (online) way of finding out if the case has been struck out? I may need to start preparing my defence for end of Feb. Thanks in advance.

CEL has a habit of destroying trees

The cases they refer to, can you list them here and the highly experienced members will comment for you

MiguelCotto

ok first thing is they are asking for reduced payment of £125.

Then the first page states 'Witness statement of Ashley Cohen' then it goes on to say I Scott Wilson..not sure who Ashley is?

Cases (specific paragraphs) referred to:
- Parking Eye Ltd v Beavis
- Vine v London Borough of Waltham Forest (2000 EWCA Civ 106

They also included:
- POFA 2012 part 3 chapter 2
- The Road Vehicles (Registration and Licensing) Regulations 2002
- Cavendish Square Holding BV v Talal El Makdessi / Parking Eye Ltd v Beavis

nosferatu1001

1) You will not be "preparing your defence". you will be writing your WS and compiling your exhibits, as the newbies thread is utterly explicit on! Your defence is done
2) Sounds like a thing to say to the judge - whose witness statement is this meant to be? Also, they dont turn up. No firm does. prevents you directly questioning them on their usually fraudulent claims

cases:
- Yes, you know exactlywhat that case says and importantly doesnt, because its THE case really.
- easy, again quoted bloody everywhere. That Vine was deemed to have seen signs because they were prominent, numerous, lit etc . Doesnt mean you are ALWAYS assumed to have seen a sign, especially if its hidden in the middle of a bush...
- POFA - erm, that just says you can recover parking charges, at para 56. The rest has no use
- why did they include that? To say your V5 shoul dhave been kept up to date? Obviously this has no bearing on whether a driver has an debt nor whether they can recover that supposed debt from a keeper.
- dont recall the last.

Redx

MiguelCotto wrote: »

I've received a big bunch of defence paperwork from CEL - Photos of the car park etc & some copies of other cases - looks like a big case file. It might be for the purposes of intimidation. They say that a legal representative will be at the hearing and not 'Scott Wilson' who was the name on all the previous documentation.

Is there a quick (online) way of finding out if the case has been struck out? I may need to start preparing my defence for end of Feb. Thanks in advance.

It's not defence paperwork , you are the defendant defending your case and any defence paperwork is yours

Your defence has already been submitted , so you cannot prepare your defence , it's already been submitted

If you have received a bundle it's their WS plus exhibits pack

I hope you have done yours and given a copy to the court and a copy to the claimant ?

In most cases they will send a jobbing legal beagle on their behalf , rarely anyone already named

MiguelCotto

I hope you have done yours and given a copy to the court and a copy to the claimant ?

ok so the bad news is I have not done this, I've been away and only just picking this up and the deadline is today at 4pm... I have got some stuff together, images etc but wrongly assumed that I could revisit this after the 31st Jan deadline as I was hoping it would be struck out as per the letter I got from the court.

So is it too late? The court is a short drive from me so I could drop it off but I wouldn't be able to send a hard copy to the claimant in time but I could email it over if that is acceptable. And yes I am annoyed with myself...

Redx

Get all the above done today , the way you said

Post a copy by first class post to the claimant too, to back up the email

Your three bundles are

Your WS
Your exhibits
Your costs schedule

One to the court , handed in

One to the claimant by email plus post

Get a free certificate of posting from the post office counter

The third bundle goes with you on the day of the hearing

MiguelCotto

As you can imagine I am rushing like crazy to get this done in my lunch break so any help would be great considering I need to print and get to court & post office etc. I have lots of good photos. I'm not sure of the context of the POFA section 4 stuff.


In the County Court at xxxxxxxx

Claim No.: xxxxxxxx
Between

Civil Enforcement Limited
(Claimant)

-v-


xxxxxxxx
(Defendant)


Witness Statement

1. I xxxxxxxx from xxxxxxxx, the Defendant in this matter. I will say as follows:

2. The facts in this statement come from my personal knowledge. Where they are not within my own knowledge there are true to the best of my information and belief

3. I am not liable to the Claimant for the sum claimed, or any amount at all and this is my Witness Statement in support of my defence as already filed.

4. I assert that I am the registered keeper of the vehicle in question in this case. I was not the driver.

5. The paragraph numbers mentioned below relate to the Witness Statement filed by the Claimant’s paralegal, Scott Wilson or Ashley Cohen:

5.1 Ref 16. Quotes Vine v London Borough of Waltham Forest para 19 which refers to signage at the entrance of a car park. As Exhibit 1.0 shows, there is no such signage.

5.2 Ref 32. Suggests the defendant has no knowledge of the signage as he has not clarified if he was the driver but the defendant lives in the village so knows the supermarket well and uses it at least 3 times a week. It has never been clear to me by the signage that a fine was payable if overstaying.

6. The claimant quotes Parking Eye Limited v Beavis. Exhibit 7 shows the comparison of the signs in this case v the sign in the Beavis case and shows they are not comparable.

7. I did not respond to the brightly-coloured alarmist Notices sent to me by DRP / CEL etc because I believed they were spam (this sort of scam had been exposed on Watchdog). Also, as I was not the driver and these were not offences or fines from an Authority like a Council, there was no reason or obligation upon a registered keeper to ‘appeal’ to what appeared to be junk mail. I have since researched this, hence my knowledge that these are non-POFA PCNs, incapable of holding me liable anyway.


8. The arguments by Civil Enforcement Limited all relate to a contract being entered into by visibility of the signage. All exhibits, (the claimants & the defendants) all show the signage to be inadequate and is therefore unreliable especially if you have any kind of visual impairment. Civil enforcement Limited has submitted several images which show no signage whatsoever.

9. I was never shown the alleged signage contract photos. As registered keeper, I never saw the ‘contract’ they are trying to hold me liable for, until this WS where they have sent some photos, from 2016 and an aerial map which is no proof of the signs on the day of the alleged contravention.



I invite the Court to dismiss this vexatious claim in its entirety, and to award my costs of attendance at the hearing, such as are allowable pursuant to CPR 27.14.

Statement of Truth

I believe that the facts stated in this Witness Statement are true.

Signature


Date

MiguelCotto

OK well they are all sent - not ideal I know but at least they are in.