Did Green Jellyfish Respond

Last week we wrote to Fladgate LLP, who act for both Christophi and Green Jellyfish.

We put to Fladgate that Green Jellyfish submits R&D claims with no technical basis, and all it does is review a company’s corporation tax returns and accounts. We also put to them that Kirby & Haslam invent justifications for Green Jellyfish’s claims after the fact.

There were several curious features to Fladgate’s response:

• The Fladgate letter was labelled as “confidential”. It wasn’t. Solicitors are not permitted to falsely label letters as confidential, and one solicitor is currently appearing before the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal as a result of such a mislabelling.16

• Most of Fladgate’s letter to us is taken up with allegations of an “unlawful means conspiracy” against Green Jellyfish by former employees, rival R&D advisers, and an individual who Christophi is currently suing. We have no interest or understanding of any of this (we’re confident that Sophie’s story is real). It is, however, most unusual for a solicitor to put in correspondence what amounts to a conspiracy theory.

• Fladgate deny that Green Jellyfish or Kirby & Haslam is behaving improperly, but the denial is very non-specific.

• Specific denials are then included in a separate email from Christophi (on behalf of Kirby & Haslam) and an unknown individual representing Green Jellyfish, which Fladgate forwarded to us. The evidence above (and other evidence we have collated) shows these denials to be false.

• The Christophi/Green Jellyfish email rather deceptively ducks our allegation that it’s improper for Green Jellyfish to claim that care homes, restaurants and childcare companies can often claim R&D relief. (“The legislation is very clear and does not exclude a company from making an R&D claim based solely on the sector.“)17

We responded to Fladgate saying that we had evidence of actual fraud; we have not heard back.

Seems as decent response … but what followed …