Sussex businessman's £30k bill

5:20pm Friday 22nd August 2008

A Sussex businessman who built a supposedly amphibious car condemned by a judge as a “floating coffin” is facing having to sell his home to meet a £30,000 court bill for breaking trading standards laws.

A judge accused Tim Dutton, of Park Crescent, Worthing, of being “glib and dishonest” and said if ever the vehicle had been used to give tourists trips on Lake Windermere as intended “it would in all likelihood have created an absolute tragedy”.

The 60-year-old carmaker, appeared in court under his full name of Tim Dutton-Woolley. He was sentenced after previously being found guilty of “consenting or conniving at” supplying to a Lake District businessman an amphibious vehicle whose claim it was “for the purpose of carrying passengers on land and/or water” was false.

He was given a six-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, and ordered to do 150 hours unpaid community work after the hearing at Carlisle Crown Court yesterday.

He was also ordered to pay £2,000 costs and £28,500 compensation to Adrian Cowdroy, who had bought the eight-seat vehicle hoping to use it to provide family tours.

Mr Cowdroy had to scrap his plans when he found the supposedly amphibious vehicle leaked and was so unstable it was not fit for use on either land or water.

The vehicle – a specially converted long wheelbase Suzuki Jimny – was condemned as unroadworthy in a series of land-based inspections and refused a licence.

At yesterday’s hearing, Dutton claimed he would have to sell his run-down £130,000 two-bedroom flat to pay the court bill.

His barrister Simon Gledhill said he should be given credit for his past success, which had seen him sell 8,000 vehicles “of various types” over a 40-year career.

Mr Gledhill said: “For the past 13 years he has been supplying a unique, original and inspiring product of his own invention. The fact that this one job went wrong was an irregular occurrence in his regular practice.”

Mr Gledhill said Dutton had never before built a vehicle as big as the one wanted by Mr Cowdroy. He said: “Perhaps his biggest mistake was ever agreeing to take the job in the first place.

The court was told Dutton set up a new business called Amphijeep after winding up his previous company Amphibious Cars – and he had wound up eight other firms he had been involved with since 1991.

Judge Paul Batty QC said Mr Cowdroy had only chosen Dutton to build the vehicle because he held himself out to be an expert. He said: “He relied upon your skill and judgment to provide him with a vehicle which you well knew was going to be used for fee-paying passengers on Windermere.

“Yet what you sold him was nothing more and nothing less than a floating coffin.”

After the hearing Mr Cowdroy said he was disappointed with the sentence because, while he had been ruined, Dutton-Woolley would be able to go on running his business.