Court Hearing this week - advice

[LittleElf]

Can I pick someone’s brains please?

I am in Court this week taking a used car dealership to court due to complete malfunction of a car.

After submitting my witness statement and evidence an incident has happened.

I had an independent engineer carry out a report for my vehicle. I received a telephone call tonight as the Defendant has contacted my independent engineer, basically stating I was a liar and its perjury which they will prove in Court , also that my independent engineers website is ‘rubbish’. My engineer felt slightly intimidated and extremely uncomfortable. The Defendant then stated at the ‘end’ of the call that he had recorded it. My engineer told the Defendant that he never asked permission to do so nor did he agree for it to be recorded.

Also the Defendant has contacted the garage I took my vehicle to get repaired. The garage has disclosed information about the nature of the repairs of the vehicle to the Defendant and our conversation.

The Defendant has told my engineer that he is in fact ‘friends’ with the person at the repairing garage and sends him a lot of work.

I reported the used car dealership to Trading Standards last year as they were extremely intimidating towards me when I mentioned issuing court proceedings.

I feel extremely anxious, intimidated and vulnerable.

[ostell]

You complain to the judge that the defendant has been intimidating your witnesses. Is your engineer appearing in court or is it just a written statement?

[LittleElf]

Its just a written report but he has stated to me tonight if the Judge wishes to make contact that is fine.

Do I make the Judge aware before proceedings begin?

[LittleElf]

Also should the repairing garage be disclosing information to the Defendant? Obviously if I knew they were friends and they sent him a ‘lot of work’ I would never have used that garage.

[efpom]

Two brief points.
1 - Witness intimidation is a criminal offence - report the matter to the police straightaway & get a crime reference number. Tell the judge at the hearing that you have reported it to the police.
2 -The Defendant's conduct sets up a claim for your costs - unreasonable conduct - if small claims track CPR 28.14

I assume that the nature of the repairs is mentioned in your Witness Statement, which, I assume exhibits written evidence, which presumably the repairing garage supplied to you.

[LittleElf]

efpom will it be classed as witness intimidation if the engineer is not appearing in court (although he will if the judge needs him to) they phoned him asking what inspection he had done and recorded the call etc.

Yes the nature of the repairs its in my witness statement, the exhibits attached are my engineers report and the repairing documents from the garage.

I also attached the MOT as when I bought the car in the JULY the MOT was until November only. The used car dealership said to me to take it away and bring it back 11 days later for a fresh MOT. When the vehicle had been to a third party garage for MOT it came back as ‘do not drive this car has dangerous defects’ it was the tyres. I had driven it for 11 days at this point. They stated they carry out a pre-inspection of the vehicle. This obviously wasn’t picked up and I drove it for 11 days with it being dangerous.

[efpom]

Don't get bogged down with this.

You have described a state of affairs which on it's face is criminal conduct, which hinders or frustrates the administration of justice. The only proper course for the defendant is to challenge the evidence in court. The defendant would seem to have challenged the evidence by approaching the authors of the evidence directly, outside the courtroom. Your only proper course is to report the matter to the police and bring the state of affairs to the attention of the judge at the beginning of the hearing and the fact that you reported that state of affairs to the police.

Good luck!

[LittleElf]

The garage were I have took my car to for repairs were I was a customer has disclosed all my information to the Defendant without my consent. The repairing garage has done a statement for the Defendant (which I have not seen) stating the repairs I have had carried out as I have now found out they are friends with each other.

[LittleElf]

efpom can I please ask something? The repairing garage who I was a customer of disclosed my information to the Defendant following my evidence of were I had my vehicle repaired and the invoices I submitted as evidence and the Defendant made contact with him.

Yes he has disclosed conversations and information regarding the vehicle.

But.....further he has given a statement for the Defendant (which I have not received and hoping will be inadmissible) is the Defendant, considering their undisclosed evidence and breaching GPDR in getting a statement from the garage?

What reason, would the garage give a statement to the Defendant of one of their customers if they didn’t have a vested interest in the Defendant?

[efpom]

It seems to me that the Defendant’s antics are aimed at distracting you from concentrating on the upcoming hearing. It also seems to me, from your writing, that he has had some success!

The fact that the Defendant has indulged in those antics, is a paradigm example of a Defendant whose defence is very weak.

You cannot stop the Defendant’s antics from continuing. However, his antics work in your favour, because if the judge at trial, thinks that his antics were aimed at leaning on people in order to get them to change documents exhibited by you, he had better come to court with a toothbrush.

I refer you to my writing at post 5 and end with the hope that you act on it and my wish that you succeed in the upcoming hearing.

[LittleElf]

efpom The judge ruled in my favour as he did not have a copy of the Defendants witness statement and the fact he tried to contact the Defendant 3 times via telephone with no response.

Can they now contest this? And come up with an excuse as to why the did not attend?

[efpom]

The Defendant can appeal the judgment - what his grounds would be is unknown, but simply not pitching up to the hearing, absent cogent reasons will not cut it!

Meantime, you await the judgment order and when that is in hand then enforce it.

You might think it worthwhile to post up the judgment order.

[LittleElf]

efpom Can he appeal the judgement or set it aside?

I found this on the Courts website:-

You may also have to get permission from the appeal court if yours was a small claims case, and the decision was made in your absence because you did not go to the hearing.

In a small claims case if you do not attend and you have not given the court notice that you are not attending, the party can apply to set aside judgment and not appeal. If you have given the court notice that you are not attending and you do not agree with the decision, it is an appeal.

[efpom]

The defendant has used up his set aside 'chance'.
He has not attended the final hearing - he has not given any notice to the court of his intention not to appear. He cannot therefore have applied for permission to appeal the judgment on the day.

He can still appeal the final judgment, but he needs to apply for permission

I suggest you give a close reading to CPR 52 which deals with appeals

https://www.justice.gov.uk/courts/pr...es/part52#52.3

[LittleElf]

efpom Yes I have had a look at that and the Defendant has already applied for set aside once earlier in the proceedings stating he didn’t receive the Claim Form.

But this Part 27 is confusing me stating that if the Defendant was not present at the hearing of the claim and has not give written notice to the court may apply for an order that a Judgement under this part be set aside.

or am I completely wrong here?