J Collingridge - a full report in progress.

Heartfeltdawn

@ellangus

Our new member says he went to school with Collingridge and later bumped into him at Langley College around 96/97, suggesting their schooling was early 1990's. 

JC didn't pick up a camera until 2008 and then went to Dewsbury College. 192 has him in that sort of area around 2005-07. So it is more than conceivable that he moved between the end of his Langley days and the start of his Dewsbury College study. 

And here's your smoking gun. Jonathan Louis Collingridge, named in the class of 1996 attending Desborough School, Maidenhead. The middle name initial checks out with the 192 link above. 

http://namesdatabase.com/people/COLLINGRIDGE/JONATHAN LOUIS/34623738

digitalscream

Well, well...Collingridge just sent this to my wife on Facebook:

digitalscream

This is my response:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hi Jonathan, I find it quite amazing that you've decided to try to track down my wife, as opposed to picking up the phone and calling me - as I've asked you to many times. I can only assume that you're trying to cause trouble for my family, but regardless of that...I'll respond to all of your points in turn: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ *I'm genuinely sorry that I have to involve you in this but your husband is leaving me with no choice. Actually, since you tried to get a phoney DMCA request through, I haven't heard from you. I've tried to engage you on multiple occasions, but your refusal to speak to me leads me to the conclusion that you're too scared to face someone who actually has all the evidence and knows exactly what you've been up to. *Since this started in March I have called the Police multiple times to report Mr Daffern for the topics started on his website showing my families details, and now I have been made aware of another topic giving details of our friend’s child. Yes, and every time the Police have told you to back off because there has not actually been any crime committed and they've confirmed that we're in the clear. Not only that, but we've shown the Police the cast-iron evidence that we were pro-active in removing your personal details from the site before you even asked for it to be done. Just reporting something to the Police doesn't actually mean anything, no matter how many times you do it or how many times you tell people you've done it. The fact that you refuse to actually engage with me despite multiple attempts at contacting you would indicate to me that you're more interested in causing drama and stamping your feet than actually resolving anything (that's just my personal opinion, though, and despite that I'm still trying to get to the actual detail of what you think is illegal on the site; with millions of hits a month and hundreds of thousands of comments, no court in the land would expect us to read it all - you have to actually give us the proper details of what's wrong, and where it is). *Seeing as Mr Daffern has ignored the Police requests to remove my wife and daughters (Photos / Name / addresses / car reg / phone numbers / work addresses & work emails) from his site, then I assume that he will do the same with this. No, see...that's not true. There is no part of the site which has any personally identifiable details of you or your family. If there is, give me the URLs and I'll look at it and remove them. I haven't ignored any requests from the Police - they've directly verified that there's no breach of the law in any of the content on the site regarding you and your scams, and they have all of my contact details; they've been in touch a number of times, so I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that I've ignored any request. Please supply the details of each of these requests - which Police officer made it, what they asked for and when. *So I’m hoping that you might be able to help have them removed. Nothing to remove, according to the Police. <continued...>

digitalscream

*It's been one thing for Mr Daffern and his friends to attack me, but my daughter had to leave her college course in September because of comments made by Fretboard members on her blog and Facebook pages. The details of my wife's work as a teacher have also been posted and her school is aware of the Defamatory comments made on the website. They may also be considering a Defamation Legal case against your husband because of the nature of the comments, just as I have discussed with my solicitors. I have never attacked you on the site - in fact, I've never attacked you at all. I've asked you to get in touch on numerous occasions in order to HELP you get this resolved. Nobody can bring a defamation suit against me, because I haven't made any defamatory comments about you (despite what you imagine to be true); I've already had that confirmed by my solicitor. Not only that, but I'm protected from prosecution because of other people's comments by the Safe Harbour provisions in the law (as a service provider), as is my ISP. If you'd really spoken to a solicitor about bringing a lawsuit against me, they would have told you exactly the same thing. If your daughter really had to leave college because of this, then I would recommend that you speak to your solicitor, because there are extremely basic legal procedures he can go through to formally ask us to help in identifying the people who caused it. Of course, that would also require sworn testimony from your daughter and the college to that effect, and as you've completely failed to back up any of your claims at any point since this all started (including the slightly macabre one about calling the Police because of your made-up story that somebody threatened to burn your house down with your kids in it, which PC <redacted because he doesn't want to have his name in public> is also aware of), I'm going to assume that you've made this one up too until presented with actual evidence to the contrary. *One of the recent topics that has been passed on to me today, shows members including your husband planning to send used sex toys to my wife work, which I'm sure you'll agree is completely unacceptable.

Which topic? And what comment did I make about sending used sex toys to you? Please provide me with the URL so that I can a) refresh my memory, and b) examine it for any illegal content. *The multiple topics about me and they way they have been manipulated to affect my business has been seen by my clients as childish internet trolling, especially when they started contacting my customers saying that I’m a sex offender, but I cannot stand back and allow my family to be attacked. Who contacted your customers and said that you're a sex offender? It certainly wasn't me, but we'll obviously cooperate with the Police if there's an investigation into it, because that's actionable slander. *I have just added the copies of these new topics to the evidence that has already been passed onto Thames Valley Police, as there is a current criminal investigation into Fretboard members who have been impersonating me online. Excellent - unfortunately, given that you haven't actually given me any details of these threads, there's no chance of me ever having complied with a request to remove them. As I've said on almost every occasion when I've tried to contact you, I want to actually make sure that we're complying with the law...but you're not giving us the chance to do so, so there's precisely zero chance of you ever managing to bring a successful suit against me or the other admins of the site. *Again I'm sorry to involve you, but as you can see your husband seems to have no problem in involving my family.

As you well know, I've not once said anything about your family. In fact, other than speaking to the Police, my ISP and my solicitors every time you've come up with yet another one of your bogus claims, I've basically had zero involvement in any of this. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Yet again, I'm going to ask that you call me on (07989) 961 948 to actually discuss this like an adult instead of everything you've done so far, which is equivalent to stamping your feet like a child. In the interests of full disclosure, we've assembled the full pack of evidence available to us - including everything that our members have dug up about your previous exploits - at PC <redacted because he doesn't want to have his name in public>'s request, and sent it to him. Should the Police wish to take anything further (and I'm guessing they won't, given that I haven't heard from them in over 6 weeks, but I have no idea how much paperwork's involved), you may be able to request a copy of that from them. I will also be sending him screenshots of the conversation you attempted to start with my wife, as well as this reply.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I responded from my own Facebook account, and he accepted the contact request...I have a strong suspicion that he'll try to trump up some way to accuse me of abuse via Facebook and get my account shut down, but it's just another part of the hassle I apparently have to bear

digitalscream

Oh, and...

Thank you, Facebook, for letting me know that he's at least seen it.

Heartfeltdawn

Fuck me with a bargepole etc. 

Wowzers. 

digitalscream

Heartfeltdawn said:

Fuck me with a bargepole etc. 

Wowzers. 

Yeah, you're right. I suppose I did get a bit too verbose with my response.

Heartfeltdawn

The air of desperation is as strong as ever with him. 

-His stepdaughter was never pictured here. I've never seen their car registration anywhere as all plates are covered up on Google Maps and his Gumtree ads didn't show a number plate. His daughter has never had her work address up here. 

-His wife's place of work was removed. It wasn't hard to find. 

-Involving his family? He tried to carry out scams using the names of his stepchildren as a Paypal address! We have that as evidence and so does PC Neil Bevan. He tried ripping me off on eBay using a false name concocted from the names of his stepkids!

-Friend's child? I have no idea what he's rambling on about. 

-The accusation about his daughter leaving her college course due to comments made on her blog and on her Facebook page: I've seen as much as anyone on the whole Collingridge case. I've NEVER seen her blog. Comments made on her Facebook page: impossible. For one thing, there is one Frances Ginnelly on Facebook who has a very closed off profile with no action since 2011. Fairly recently though Frankie Collingridge has appeared up there and it is her. Again there is no way of posting up things on her Facebook page because it's closed off. 

-Her leaving college: his stepdaughter was the two year old dangled from a window mentioned in this article in 1998. That was December 1998, meaning she was born in 1996 which would make her 19 now. 

Her own Facebook page says that she studied Level 3 travel and tourism at West Herts College. The Level 3 diploma is a two-year long course. If she started after her GCSEs, then she would have begun 2012, finished the first year in 2013, and completed it in 2014. Her own page uses the phrase 'studied' implying the course is over. His claim that she had to leave her course is more of his usual horseshit. 

TTony

Heartfeltdawn said:

Here's my breakdown of things. 

Lateralus462: claims to be called Chris and from Oxfordshire. Says he went to school with JC and ended up at Langley College with him. I'm taking that as Langley College, Berkshire. 

I think he's genuine. 

1. He says he came from Basschat. He has a feedback thread going back to 2008. Location Oxfordshire, name of Chris. Looks very legit. 

If anyone is a member on Basschat (@fretmeister?) could they contact Lateralus462 there and just double-check that he has signed up here.  Else I'm thinking a possible ID theft and impersonation here.

Not that anyone involved in this thread has any history of theft of any kind.

digitalscream

OK, I've just had a fairly long, relatively productive phone call from his wife. It's going to take a while to process and figure out, but I'll post in here when I've got the chance.

The long and the short of it, though, is that we've proposed a compromise whereby the sleuthing threads are archived (or potentially just some of the posts with people's details and history), and a public sticky is posted warning people of what he's done. From their side, anybody who's contacted me from other sites who can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that they're still owed money will get it back. The final part of the proposition is that she guarantees that he won't do this again; if he does, I'll give her a courtesy call and - failing an immediate resolution - the content will go back up and the authorities will likely be brought in.

IMPORTANT NOTE: This is just a brief record of our discussion. It's not necessarily what we're going to do - I still have to speak to the other admins about this.

On a personal note, she seems like a perfectly reasonable (and slightly exasperated) human bean. It was a much more constructive and relatively pleasant conversation than I was expecting when I saw his name come up on my phone

digitalscream

OK, I've spoken to the other admins, and we all agree that - as long as everything's done in good faith from both ends - this is the best way forward for the forum, and for his past victims.

I'll post further updates as we go through the process.

Heartfeltdawn

From a forum point of view, I think it is the best way forward.

I admit that I find the notion of a compromise with a man who has committed fraud on a variety of platforms, sent legal threats to several people, and made a number of lurid allegations that verge on slander to be very generous on the part of the forum. 

However, based on what Digi has told me by PM, I think it is the right way forward and it is clear that JC is finally in the shit with someone who can and will take him to task, hopefully involving a cheese grater, two dozen hungry mosquitoes, and a very very firm pineapple. 

From a personal point of view, I have two comments:

1. Can I suggest that we get a written agreement with Collingridge? All it would need is an email from a forum rep to say what the forum will and won't do (ie. threads taken out of the public eye, public sticky put up detailing JC's dealings), and that Collingridge sends one accordingly detailing what he will do and what he won't do (ie. that he will stop scamming and bugging the forum and he won't rip people off). 

2. I also think that we shouldn't hide things away and all the rest until we have a final definitive statement from Thames Valley Police/PC Bevan. Although it is unlikely that anything would happen, technically Digi and I still have had no final verdict after being contacted by the police after having our details given to them by JC. Once we have confirmation that investigation is going no further, then I think we should change the forum as agreed with JC/Mrs JC. 

digitalscream

Yep - the agreement is actually between myself and his wife. Quite frankly, I trust her word far more than I trust his...not least because there are no consequences to him breaking a promise to me, but breaking a promise to her?

Given what she's been through before, I'm guessing she's a damn sight scarier than I am.

#1 - Yes, good idea...however, I'll be getting that from her rather than him. It'll be more constructive that way (and probably more binding too, given the above).

#2 - I've sent TVP a brief summary of the agreement-in-principle. If they so desire, they can call the Collingridge household to (hopefully) confirm the complaint is resolved.

Heartfeltdawn

#1 - That all sounds fine to me. With the agreement between you and her, that essentially makes his behaviour accountable directly to her. 

#2 - Excellent. I'll drop Bevs an email tomorrow asking for an update that I can keep for my own records. 

TTony

I did think that all the sleuthing threads were already locked away in this section - with access by invitation only (so out of the public domain).

If I've missed any threads (and I'm guessing that @heartfeltdawn might know them better than me!), stick a link in this thread, and I'll move them.

Heartfeltdawn

TTony said:

I did think that all the sleuthing threads were already locked away in this section - with access by invitation only (so out of the public domain).

If I've missed any threads (and I'm guessing that @heartfeltdawn might know them better than me!), stick a link in this thread, and I'll move them.

I thought they were all hidden as well. The highest ranking Fretboard page on a "J COllingridge" Google search is this one but it doesn't give any public information. 

http://thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/36596/eeny-meeny-miny-moe-catch-an-architectural-photographer-by-his-toe

digitalscream

TTony said:

I did think that all the sleuthing threads were already locked away in this section - with access by invitation only (so out of the public domain).

If I've missed any threads (and I'm guessing that @heartfeltdawn might know them better than me!), stick a link in this thread, and I'll move them.

He seems to have access to them - he was quoting details to me (well, referring to them in his obtuse manner). I may point out later in the process that it's actually illegal if they've found a way to circumvent the security on this forum (although they'll no doubt see this post after I've given them read-only access).

When she asked for them to be "archived", we agreed that they would be accessible only to the admins of the site.

Heartfeltdawn

digitalscream said:

He seems to have access to them - he was quoting details to me (well, referring to them in his obtuse manner). I may point out later in the process that it's actually illegal if they've found a way to circumvent the security on this forum.

When she asked for them to be "archived", we agreed that they would be accessible only to the admins of the site.

I'd be interested to know what details... 

digitalscream

Heartfeltdawn said:

digitalscream said:

He seems to have access to them - he was quoting details to me (well, referring to them in his obtuse manner). I may point out later in the process that it's actually illegal if they've found a way to circumvent the security on this forum.

When she asked for them to be "archived", we agreed that they would be accessible only to the admins of the site.

I'd be interested to know what details... 

Ah, just bits and pieces from this thread and a few others.

dano

digitalscream;875249" said:

He seems to have access to them - he was quoting details to me (well, referring to them in his obtuse manner). I may point out later in the process that it's actually illegal if they've found a way to circumvent the security on this forum (although they'll no doubt see this post after I've given them read-only access).

When she asked for them to be "archived", we agreed that they would be accessible only to the admins of the site.

It's wouldn't be hard for him to buy a PAYG SIM on a different network and sign up here, would give him a different IP, just to allow him to monitor all this stuff. It may well have been done a long time ago. Worth checking who has permissions to view this area with a very low post count.