Monday, 26 April 2010

April 9th Letter.

This is the letter I received from the Court of Protection (CoP) on April 12th.

Unusually it comes with a security classification - PROTECT. This is the lowest level of security classification coming below even Private or Confidential and translates as "don't just throw this away." However if you didn't know that you might find it intimidating to find something like that printed on a document and be careful about who you show it too. That would make it difficult for any impartial advisor to check that the ensuing legal proceeding was carried out fairly and accurately. That said I'm not actually going to post the letter up on this blog. That's not because I'm afraid to it just that's a lot of hassle and apparently when I post letters up here they're so small no-one can read them anyway.

The contents of the letter is actually quite pedestrian. It merely informs me that the COP-7 application has been accepted and I therefore have to serve my grandmother and father with copies of the COP-7 form and the COP-5 form within 21 days of the date the application was issued. It also informs me that after those forms have been served I then I have 7 days to return two COP-20 to inform the court that the other forms have been served. It also informs me that once all the forms are in their right place the court will consider the application as soon as is practical but in any event the Court will give further direction within 21 weeks if no oral hearing is required and within 15 weeks if a oral hearing is required. Although it doesn't mention it in the letter an oral hearing is normally carried out in the Judges chambers so is more like being summoned to the headmaster's office then an episode of Law & Order. Finally the letter gives the Courts contact details which is basically their website; http://www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk.

While we're on the subject of letters I also received one from the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG) dated April 12th. After re-stated the methods and time limits required to raise an objection this letter goes on to conceded that an objection was raised in December 2009 but was not included in the case file. However it does not admit that the OPG were at fault in not doing that. In short they've accepted that an error has been made but have stopped short of admitting responsibility for that error. Assuming the law is allowed to run its course free of interference, which should go with out saying, the best outcome the OPG can hope for is that the Judge overturns their decision but doesn't do so in such a way as to allow me to sue them for costs and damages. That's why the Brits have been pushing very hard about how dangerous it will be for me to proceed and I should probably back down. You see me backing down is the only chance they have of winning here.

As for my father he's finally reached that stage where he's accepted that realistically there's nothing he can do about this. That conclusion was helped by the realisation that if these LPA's haven't been properly registered then they don't exist and anyone, including Croydon Council can challenge them. The worst case scenario for him is that if he uses them to obtain money he could be charged with theft by deception which carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison. In short he's been stitched up by those around him. Sadly this realisation will do nothing to shake his faith in those who've been abusing him for all these years.

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