R v George Banks (t/a Northern Promotions)

Date

17 March 2005

Legislation

Trade Marks Act 1994, s.92

Keywords

car boot fairs; criminal offences; liability of operator of fair; aiding and abetting

Counsel

Unknown

Solicitors

Redcar and Cleveland Trading Standards

Judge

District Judge Earl

Court

unknown

Reported

unreported

Summary

Banks operated car boot fairs at a number of locations in Redcar and Cleveland including the Wetherby and Carlisle racecourses. In 2001 Banks agreed to ‘police’ his fairs and report sales of suspected counterfeit items to the local trading standards. In early 2003 it was discovered that extensive counterfeit selling was going unreported at the fairs.

Several sellers at the fairs were prosecuted for selling counterfeit goods and the trading standards case against Banks relied on the assertion that the illegality of the sales was obvious to anyone passing the stalls in question. Accordingly it was argued that Banks had aided and abetted the sale of the counterfeit goods.

Banks and his stewards argued that they were not experts in counterfeit products, that they were elsewhere during the first hour of the fairs when most sales took place, or that the sellers hid their counterfeit products when the stewards were in their vicinity.

Decision:

District Judge Earl found for the council and held that

• the counterfeit nature of the goods was plain to see; and
• there was no evidence showing Banks being involved in the sales themselves but the passive stance he took towards amounted to aiding and abetting offences under the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 and the Trade Marks Act 1994.

Banks was therefore found guilty for 24 specimen counts of copyright and trade mark offences, fined a total of £6000, and ordered to pay £2000 towards the council’s costs.

Note: although in this case the operator was found guilty this was an exceptional result.