Mark Hales

Mike Pass

Supporter
+1
A very bad situation. We all want to read about interesting cars being driven by skilled drivers at racing speeds as we will not get the chance to do this especially with rare and interesting cars like the 917. As we all know Mark is a very skilled driver who has a vast experience of driving just about every type of car you can think of. He has driven many cars owned by many members of the GT40 fraternity. I would be willing to let him drive my car. This is very much a no win situation but I do feel that Mark has been hit with an excessive bill over this one. Glad to help.

Cheers
Mike
 

Mike Pass

Supporter
Further to the Mark Hales story we have received this note of thanks from him to all the people who have sent some money to help him out. It is hard to believe that Piper's lawyers are trying to take away his home. I think that that is disgraceful. I am at a loss to see as to why the magazine have not sorted this out as he was driving the car for them. I feel very sorry for him as is a good guy and I hope he can find a resolution to this issue.
Anyway here is the text of the thank you note from Mark.





To everybody who has been kind enough to donate...

My apologies for this round robin email, but the fund and its details has been kept remote from me for obvious reasons. The good people who set it up were obviously keen that Piper and his henchmen couldn't get their hands on it, but that means I haven't seen any of the messages. I wanted to send this much sooner but when a way was finally found to extract all the addresses from Paypal, they arrived as a long list. So here we are.

Thank you all so much for your support, it does mean a lot. It sounds trite to say that there are more deserving causes, because there certainly are, but when something affects you personally to this extent, it's very real indeed. Your help is very welcome, as have been the expressions of support from so many quarters. The fund has already meant that some of the legal bills have been paid.

At the moment, it isn't feasible that Piper can be paid off. The judgement was for £120,000, of which £63,000 (plus VAT) was his legal costs, and I do know that despite the generosity of many people, the fund stands a long way short of that. His lawyers are currently trying to take the family home which is deeply upsetting for my partner Allison but we are doing our very best to protect her interest. I didn't sign up to put our home, future livelihood and my sanity on the line in order to drive a millionaire's car for a magazine feature.

Thank you for any messages of support too and please excuse the fact that I am not able to reply individually. I am bearing up reasonably well and doing my best to get back to work. If I may, and now I have this list, I will keep you all advised of any developments

Thanks again.

Mark
 

Jim Rosenthal

Supporter
Piper has a deservedly shady reputation. Mark Hales is not a wealthy man and works for a living, although we would all like to have such a job.

Piper an ass? Keith, you are too kind to him. Complete toadpipe might be a better description.


I did not know that in the UK you could take someone's house away from them by suing them. I did not think you could do that over here, but I may be wrong. In any case, I hope Mr. Hales is able to prevail on appeal.
 
Jim, you certainly can take somebody's house away from them in the process of enforcing a judgment against them for money damages.

However, in most US States there is a "homestead exemption" in bankruptcy law such that if the person against whom the judgment is being enforced declares bankruptcy then their house will, in most cases, be off limits to those seeking to enforce the judgment. In most states the homestead exemption is not unlimited....it may be just a matter of $50,000 or $100,000 in equity that is exempted...which is often all, or in excess, of the equity available thus the house is essentially exempted completely. The one exception is Florida which has an unlimited homestead exemption...and that's the very reason all the Wall Street tycoons who have lost mega-million/billion fraud cases run down to Florida and build mega-mansions...to try to protect and preserve some amount of personal wealth for post-bankruptcy.

Long winded explanation here about US law. The bottom line is that you give someone else your car to drive at high speed then you accept the risk of loss that may stem from that decision. Piper is bringing bad karma onto himself.
 
I am a criminal & civil litigation solicitor and if Mark requires legal assistance, then I offer my services for free. The only caveatt being that I am not insured for private client work, so "user beware"! My email is [email protected] and my evening/weekend phone number is 01306628320. Naturally, any approach to me will be kept strictly confidential. Regards.. Andrew
 

Mike Pass

Supporter
Just to bring this thread back into the light and the disgraceful attitude of David Piper.
I just received this email from Mark

To everybody who has been kind enough to donate...

Apologies again for this round robin email, and also to those kind people I may have missed last time.

Thank you all so much for your generosity and support in this unpleasant matter. Your contributions allowed me to keep the fight going for a bit longer, and to survive while it was all going on. It’s amazing how these things completely take over your life and working productively is one of the first things that suffers.

I use the past tense in the context of the fight, because on June 11th Piper purchased the last piece of his retribution and succeeded in making me bankrupt.

Piper has now spent nearly £80,000 in his efforts to bankrupt me and has refused all offers to settle. A group headed by the CEO of Nick Mason’s businesses had organised some serious fund raising activities and Nick and others had kindly underwritten a minimum of £50,000. This was on the table, plus whatever surplus came from the fundraising, plus anything remaining in your fund. Piper refused the offer saying he would continue with the bankruptcy proceedings.

I have the interview with the Official Receiver on Tuesday. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Thanks again
Mark



How anyone can think it is justified to bankrupt someone over an argument over a blown up engine is beyond my comprehension. I am disgusted by this.

Mike
 
I am a criminal & civil litigation solicitor and if Mark requires legal assistance, then I offer my services for free. The only caveatt being that I am not insured for private client work, so "user beware"! My email is [email protected] and my evening/weekend phone number is 01306628320. Naturally, any approach to me will be kept strictly confidential. Regards.. Andrew

That is commendable Andrew

I do have a question shouldnt the magazine have insurance to cover such events???
 

Keith

Moderator
Mark is a freelance which means that whilst a magazine MAY have commissioned Mark to do a story, they have no consequential liability. On the other hand, it may well have been an unsolicited piece that Mark originated in order to sell the feature to an interested publisher.

Either way, he was self employed and should have carried his own indemnity insurance/public liability although I am certain that such cover for this style of event (if it even exists) would have been punitively expensive.
 
Hi mike thanks for posting update.
Mark Hales has driven a southerngt on track a few times if the owner allows someone to drive there car they do so at ther own risk things can go wrong.I feel very sorry for Mark on the outcome of this. Regards mick(southerngt)
 

Mike

Lifetime Supporter
Did Hale and the magazine pursue Piper for the opportunity to drive the car and do an article for the publication or did Piper offer it up for publicity? That context would be helpful when considering the events that have transpired.
 
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