Today I have "most ethically" triggered a chain of events that may be of great interest to the Royal College of Alternative Medicine. Nothing beats good evidence, and I've just posted a load of it to the Irish Government's Office of the Director Of Corporate Enforcement.

I'm going to be very careful with this post, since I don't want to fall foul of Joseph Obi's crack legal team, headed by the Formidable International Human Rights Advocate, Tanja "I'm not a Solicitor" Suessenbach.

I therefore absolutely won't be accusing the Royal College of Alternative Medicine or Dr. Joseph C. Obi of any wrongdoing here, or making any other libelous claims like some blogs are prone to do. Instead, I thought I'd randomly tell you a few bits and bobs about the ROI's Companies Acts, and Corporate Enforcement.

- - - - - - - -

Those seeking to make a complaint about a company registered in Ireland have to go to the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement, and get hold of a scary-looking form. It's quite a serious form too - in signing it, you are advised to waive anonymity. It can be disclosed to persons "affected" by the proceedings, and requires you to declare your willingness to attend court as a witness.

It also lists 15 complaint categories, the idea being that you tick those that apply, and then attach a written statement explaining them in detail, along with any supporting evidence. Let's pick some random examples, and see how they'd apply to a purely hypothetical company.

B3: Non-Disclosure (or Inadequate Disclosure) of Information - Failure to provide full details of directors' and company secretaries' names, addresses ... in filings to the CRO.

So, for example, if you submitted details of your directors' residential addresses that were actually mail-forwarding services or even faked, you'd be in trouble under this section.

A1: Unqualified Activity - Company having no directors within the State

So, for example, if having eliminated all the faked and spoofed addresses you found no evidence that any of the directors of a company lived in Ireland, they'd be in trouble under this section.

D1: Reckless or Malicious Conduct - Knowingly carrying on company business ... for a fraudulent purpose.

So for example if you were a one-man outfit with a mailbox charging thousands of euros for a certificate, from a website set up to deceive visitors into thinking you were something that you weren't, then you would be obtaining money by deceit and could be in trouble under this section.

- - - - - - - - -

Anyway, leaving aside my little tutorial on the ODCE and the random illustrative examples I showed you above, as a result of some digging into a particular alternative health company I've compiled a dossier consisting of a brief 5 page report, and attached evidence, stuck it in a fat envelope with ODCE on the front, and it will be dropped off at the Post Office on my way home from work today.

The report consists of an introduction stating which allegations I'm making, followed by a page-long introduction providing a little bit of background about the person in question. Following this, I state each of the four allegations providing full references. Where appropriate print-outs of these sources are then included in a set of appendices.

What happens next? My correspondence will be acknowledged on receipt by the ODCE, and then evaluated to see if there is a case. Either way, I will be advised in due course, however they state that it is not their practise to give reasons to close particular complaints, nor to advise complainants in detail of case progress.

I've worked meticulously to put this document together, and I'm very confident of something happening, but we'll see. Where appropriate, I will keep you all posted here.

If you'd like to know more, please contact me using: editor at layscience.net.

Further Details and Backstory:
Quackometer - The Back Story
LayScience blogs on Obi here, here, and here .