Alexander Webster Young has entered a long diatribe regarding a case he brought against me, Naunton Pugh, and which he claims to have won in court.
The facts:
1 His original claim was for over £4,600.
2 He got judgement at Blackburn county court but I later obtained judgement to set aside on the grounds that that court had given judgement 'ahead of time' - ie the judgement was made before the legal period of 28 days, from the date of notice of action being served, had ended. I also got the case transfered to Cambridge county court.
3 In his first attempt at that court, A W Young failed and the judge made some very clear observations about the validity of A W Young's claim. at the judge's invitation A W Young made an'offer' to settle of something over £2,000. I refused.
4 A W Young then tried to get summary judgement. This was thrown out because the judge very clearly said that I had a very good case of defence and also said that it could be ruled that civil action should actually be taking place in South Africa. He also made comments about the extent of A W Young's case, stating that the sole question appeared to him to be how many hours of flight training did A W Young pay for, and how many did he receive, and if any money was due back to him whom should pay? A W Young then made a written 'offer' of over £600 to settle. I refused.
5 A W Young went back to Cambridge county court, where Judge Wharton part heard the matter, ruled there was a case to be made agaisnt m,e but that A W Young's claim for over £4,600 was 'clearly absurd' and that he should rethink his claim. He adjourned at 5pm and the matter was transferred to Peterborough county court to get it on the list earlier than had it remained at Cambridge.
6 Judge Wharton there ruled that A W Young was not entitled to £4,600 but that he would give judgement in his favour for 11 hours paid for but not flown plus costs of the matter, including an overnight hotel room after the Cambridge hearing and travel costs. You should understand that an average PPL student goes solo in around 14-15 hours, a good one in around 10-12 hours and a not so good one in around 20 hours. A W Young flew just over 32 hours duel before he was competent enough to go solo. After 15 hours of instruction CFS clearly told him that he would need more than the 45 hours minimum demanded by the PPL course. He gave himself just three weeks to do the course, spent so much time trying to go solo that he failed to do more than a few hours ground school (and told the judge that, in effect, there ws no ground school on offer, whereas his own witness, Leigh Griffiths, told the court that he did 'as much ground school as possible, two to three hours a day at least') and left a day early.
7 I asked Judge Wharton for leave to appeal, which he refused.
8 However, I am still entitled to appeal and this I have done on the grounds that Judge Wharton's decision was malfounded - that is to say he gave it on an incorrect basis as he ruled that A W Young had a contract with me, whereas I say that I act only as agent for Cape Flying Services and that A W Young's contract for flying tuition and ground school was with Cape Flying Services CC, South Africa.
You can therefore see that it is not unreasonable that I have not paid A W Young anything. The matter will await my appeal hearing.
A W Young can go ahead with any action he likes to try to make me bankrupt. It will cost him money to enter the action.
It will mean that any assets that I have personally (ie not jointly with my wife) will be frozen by the court. First call on any such assets is to the Inland Revenue. Second call is to any bank to whom I owe money. Third call is to unsecured creditors, of which A W Young would be one.
The fact is that I have minimal personal assets, so any such action he takes would result in him getting nothing.
The man obviously loves playing with the law. He also obviously loves making these matters as public as he can, via pprune etc.
Anone who has followed this matter by reading his postings on Pprune may well take the view that he is vindictive, vengeful and downright nasty.
They may also take the view that he has damaged the good reputation of Cape Flying Services by making libellous statements in his postings and has identified himself as the author of such libel by posting an Email monicker that appears on all the Email correspondence on my original file on his course booking.
That damage could run to a court claim against A W Young for £500,000 by Cape Flying Services.
Watch this space.....
Thank you for your time to read this,
Naunton Pugh