In July 1999, the Department of Trade & Industry, (DTI) issued director disqualification proceedings against me.

This was prompted following the receipt of a ‘D’ report received by the Secretary of State for Trade & Industry. The content of the report as affirmed by Julian Harris Wood, a partner in the firm, Parker Wood of Stanmore Middlesex was false!

To say, one could not see the ‘Wood’ for the trees was an understatement and as a result, proceedings were issued against me by Howes Percival of Norwich, lawyers for the DTI.

The insolvency service was an agency within the DTI and the ‘Secretary of State’ for this department at the time was Kim Howells. The civil servant processing my case was a ‘jobsworth’ who went by the name of ‘Ceri Bradley Jones’. He had forwarded my case for prosecution to Howes Percival in 1999 and when I proposed that he should appear as a witness, his response was that he did not have a handle on my case?

From July 1999 to October 2001, I was pursued aggressively by ‘Howes Percival’ who was represented by Nicholas Hughes on behalf of the DTI. I had no legal representation in this new specialist field of disqualification proceedings. Costs to defend oneself using an expert solicitor would normally be in excess of £20,000 before the cost of employing an expert witness to defend you. As most expert solicitors had worked on behalf of the DTI to prosecute, good defence solicitors in disqualification proceedings were hard to find?

Allowing for the fact that Parker Wood had taken my business, income, goodwill and sold it to ‘Raymond Kennedy’ the buyer of my business, I could not submit a proper credible defence before the Companies Court in the  High Court on the day of the hearing in November 2000.

In the Companies Court civil hearing for director disqualification, Julian Harris Wood of Parker Wood, was sat in court with a police officer, DC Folkes from Hampshire Constabulary who was heard to say to Wood, “we’ll get him, (Crane) on something”?

I asked for a stay of proceedings as I was in a court, not legally represented and in the knowledge that parallel criminal proceedings were pending. The court did have the benefit of the services of an ‘amicus curiae’ having consulted the ‘attorney general’.

An amicus curiae (also amicus curiæ; plural amici curiae, literally “friend of the court“) is someone who is not a party to a case who offers information that bears on the case but who has not been solicited by any of the parties to assist a court. This may take the form of legal opinion, testimony or learned treatise (the amicus brief) and is a way to introduce concerns ensuring that the possibly broad legal effects of a court decision will not depend solely on the parties directly involved in the case. The decision on whether to admit the information lies at the discretion of the court.

The barrister for the DTI and on behalf of Howes Percival was Gregory Banner and on his web page, he acknowledges that the SOS v Kevin Crane was a notable case in his legal successes and armoury, in that he has successfully pleaded on behalf of the DTI in overturning the stay of proceedings that I had requested. There was a clear ‘inequality of arms’ before the court and it was ‘Justice Ferris’ who overturned my stay of proceedings request in ruling in his judgment that in the public interest, my case should continue and that it is up to the judge in any pending criminal trial to give me a fair hearing/trial in a criminal court.

The damage by this time was done as a result of nationwide publicity.

The ruling by justice Ferris in overturning the registrar’s decision to grant me a fair trial prejudiced my hearing not only at the Companies Court, (civil proceedings) but also at the Criminal Court in Portsmouth (criminal proceedings). Having pleaded not guilty to the claims as alleged by Julian Harris Wood on behalf of Parker Wood, I was found guilty and sentenced to six years of disqualification from being a company director or associated with the management of any company in any capacity. There was an imbalanced hearing in that Gregory Banner was a regular daily attendee before the courts in his prosecuting role, the main witness was Julian Harris Wood relying on his false affirmation and the incompetent police officer, DC Folkes who prompted the legal precedent and publicity as a result of his fishing trip in a Civil Court before pursuing parallel false allegations and charges for the CPS to prosecute in a criminal court in September 2002.

Unknown to me at the time of the Justice Ferris ruling, Justice Ferris who retired in 2003 had been employed by the insolvency service for five years prior to my case coming to court, chairing a working party committee to recommend and approve fees charged by insolvency practitioners/barons. Again, here we have a conflict of interest in that Justice Ferris ruled in favour of the plaintiff and the appeal by the DTI to overturn my request for a stay of proceedings and the right to a fair trial in both criminal and civil proceedings.

Correctly the CPS agreed with the conflict of interest and agreed with the registrar and his view and reported opinion on the right to a fair trial in a criminal court. My website was also inspired by the DTI. is www.directortargetsinjustice-dti.co.uk

My case registered a legal precedent in 2001 and in the making of ‘legal history’ an injustice was created and set in motion my pursuit for justice in putting right a considerable wrong and overturning the injustice however long it takes?

For the record, once you have been found guilty in the companies court, your name is then posted on the Companies House website in Cardiff. This website in the public interest is like a draconian rogues gallery, unique in the world of business where some 12,000 plus names of business men and women are published. Their personal details are listed including name, address, date of birth, director ban period, normally 2 -15 years and the code for what they have been banned for?

The approximate cost to the public purse is £30 million per year to pursue and prosecute and the insolvency barons clearly have an open cheque book and a license to print money for personal gain as approved by the former Justice Ferris. (Retired 2003)

The ‘DTI’ has since changed its name to ‘The Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform’. (Please see below)

Department of Trade and Industry
Department overview
Formed	19 October 1970
Preceding agencies	Board of Trade Ministry of Technology
Dissolved	28 June 2007
Superseding agency	Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform
Jurisdiction	United Kingdom
Headquarters	Victoria Street, London
Minister responsible	Various incumbents, Secretary of State for Trade and Industry
Website	http://wayback.archive.org/*/http://www.dti.gov.uk