Federal police and Tax Office officials have been called in to investigate the financial dealings of a Perth-based computer seller, who turned up to the Federal Court today without a solicitor. The company was unable to fight an injunction against its sale of cheap computers.
Its solicitor stepped off the case unexpectedly at the last minute.
"They can't tell us why they handed back the brief," Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) Perth regional director Stuart Smith told ZDNet. "But it may be that they weren't getting paid."
The competition watchdog also moved today to place an injunction on Info4pc's general manager James Rae, preventing him from personally carrying out 'certain transactions'.
The ACCC obtained an ex parte interim injunction against Info4pc.com in the Federal Court, Adelaide on January 24 for allegedly advertising AU$499 computers, of which the ACCC claims there are over 3000 unfulfilled orders.
The injunction prevented Info4pc from taking any further applications or spending in excess of AU$5000 at a time, but did not cover Rae personally.
"Today we're sought to injunct him from doing certain things," ACCC Perth regional director Stuart Smith told ZDNet.
The ACCC claims that evidence it has obtained from subpoenas raises questions of AU$190,000 being transferred from the company's Australian bank account to a bank in Spain under a company registered in England.
Info4pc has repeatedly refuted claims that it is linked to a UK-company that ripped off consumers by not supplying discount computers that were paid for up-front.
The ACCC says further evidence shows that AU$110,000 was transferred out of the same account to another account in the name of T.J.Rae. "We believe that is the brother of James - Timothy Rae."
The commission also claims in its evidence that Info4pc would distribute pay cheques of around AU$1,000 and then require staff to give Rae back a certain amount in cash.
"We have an undertaking from James Rae that he won't leave the country and that neither he nor the company will remove furniture, fittings and equipment from the [company] premises," Smith added.
With evidence now pointing to fraud, the Federal Police and Australian Tax Office are now investigating both the company James Rae, according to the ACCC.
The PC seller was originally due in court on February 8 to fight the injunction but failed to show.
The competition watchdog then filed a motion for contempt of court - arguing that, despite the injunction, the company had continued to advertise its cheap PC deal on its Web site.
Info4pc was unavailable for comment today.
A notice on its Web site said: "Due to current legal action, Info4pc.com is unable to accept or process any orders for computers or upgrades to computer systems until after the 19th February 2001. Because of this staff and management will be taking time off, which means that the telephones will not be manned until the 19th February 2001. This also goes for our telesales lines, which will re-open once we have won our court case."
