Creditors Angered

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 586, 12 February 1929, Page 1

Creditors Angered

TWICE-BANKRUPT AGENT

“Monumental Bluff”

lIIGHLY dissatisfied creditors alleged at a meeting this morning that Andrew Joseph arnier, agent, of Ponsonby ivoad, and well-known in connection with Kawau Island, had misrepresented facts to them. A resolution was passed that the official assignee should take steps to have Farmer publiclv examined.

Monumental bluff,’ was one creditor’s description of r armer’s dealings.

Much of the examination was connne dto an involved discussion on land titles, options and mortgages concerning Kawau property. At the end J* 11 all the creditors admitted that they had gained no satisfaction. Parmer owed £869 to unsecured creditors and £ 800 to secured creditors. Against the second sum he placed securities estimated to yield £1,500. 1 he surplus on the securities was given at £7OO and thfc deficiency on the estate £169. After creditors had questioned Farmer. Mr. G. N. Morris, the assignee, said that he had no sympathy with the bankrupt, whose schedule was vvorthless. Some of the assets and liabilities had not been disclosed. BANKRUPT BEFORE Farmer had been adjudicated bankrupt in July, 1922, Mr. Morris explained, and nine or ten meetings had ended with little satisfaction to the creditors. Mr. Morris thought Farmer was lucky to have gained discharge in July, 1927. “It is amazing to find him back here with a fresh crop of creditors within 18 months ” said the assignee. Bankrupt said that he had a property of six acres, with a five-roomed house, at Bon Accord Harbour, Kawau. It was subject to a mortgage of £ 800. Ho was the member of a syndicate of five which had bought Kawau pro-

perty. On the land there was a considerable quantity of valuable tea-tree. The property had been divided into fifth shares.

“Aren’t you the registered owner of five sections at Macdonald’s Bay, subject to a mortgage of £1,000?” Farmer was asked by a creditor. Farmer: It must have been before my last bankruptcy. The Creditor: You have been trying to bluff me right and left. I was foolish enough to lend you a small sum of money, too.

Farmer was closely questioned for three-quarters of an hour regarding options on K,awau property. He denied that he had the right to claim 18,000 tons of tea-tree timber as an asset.

“I’ve had to go to no end of trouble to fossick out facts about these properties,” the creditor, who was also representing another creditor, said. Mr. Morris: In the man’s first bankruptcy, the creditors did not oppose his discharge as they thought that he was an old man and could do no harm. He has taken 18 months to come back. “All his transactions have been carried out through monumental bluff,” was the opinion of another creditor’s representative.

Mr. Morris instructed Farmer to cuments relating to property in which produce to the assignee’s office all dobankrupt and his wife were interested.