article
Fuel for fraud or vice versa?
Unsigned, headed "Courtesy of Mark Goldes" · summarising Tony Edwards in the London Sunday Times · 1 December 1996
Ohio: fuel for fraud or vice versa?
Courtesy of Mark Goldes
“End of Road for Car That Ran on Water,” London Sunday Times, 1 Dec. 1996.
An Ohio court ruled against inventor Stanley Meyer, in a case recently brought against him by disgruntled investors. Meyer had sold “dealerships” and licensing rights in his Water Fuel Cell technology to interested investors, in anticipation of the day when it would power electric vehicles or even aircraft. That dream was shattered as Meyer was found guilty of fraud when his Water Fuel Cell failed to impress three “expert witnesses” who decided there was nothing revolutionary about it, rather that it was simply using conventional electrolysis. The newspaper article also stated that when one of the court experts went to examine the Water Fuel Cell driven car, it was impossible to evaluate because it was not working.
About this item
This is Fusion Facts passing on a newspaper story, not reporting the case. "Courtesy of Mark Goldes" means a reader sent in the Sunday Times article; the newsletter had not seen the court's papers. The Sunday Times piece is by Tony Edwards, in the issue of 1 December 1996, cited by Wikipedia as Features, page 12. The archive has not yet found a copy of it. The same paragraph ran in the Center's other newsletter, New Energy News, vol. 4 no. 8, December 1996, page 17, which the archive indexes as Fuel for fraud or vice versa?.
What the court record says instead. The case is Willis and Harper v. Meyer, Fayette County Common Pleas CVH19930292, and its docket corrects the paragraph in three places.
- It was a civil suit, not a prosecution. Nobody found Meyer "guilty". Judge Corzine gave judgment for the plaintiffs, orally on 7 August 1996 and in the final entry of 24 September 1996, with the finding of "gross and egregious fraud". The archive has found no criminal charge against Meyer, in Fayette County or in Franklin.
- It was not recent. The complaint was filed on 21 September 1993, three years before the article, and was tried in February and May 1996.
- The money was collected, not just ordered. The Sunday Times gave the figure as the investors' $25,000. By the time the article ran, National City Bank had paid the court $40,515.72 from Meyer's accounts under a garnishment of October 1996, and he paid the balance on 9 December.
The expert and the car. The newsletter's last sentence goes further than the newspaper did. As Wikipedia summarises the Sunday Times, the expert was Professor Michael Laughton of Queen Mary and Westfield College, London, and Meyer gave what Laughton called a "lame excuse" and did not let the examination go ahead: the car was not seen, rather than seen not working. Meyer's answer is in the WFC Public Notice to Inform: the visit was in 1990, not during the case, and the fuel injector was then, he said, under US national security review and not open to inspection. The same notice says he faxed the Sunday Times a request to retract on 2 December 1996, the day after the article.
A date that travelled. The date of this article has been attached to things that did not happen. One timeline found online reads "December 1, 1996: Stanley A. Meyer leaves General Motors in a financial dispute in Columbus, Ohio". Meyer never worked for General Motors. The date is most likely the Sunday Times's, and the "financial dispute" this case.
The original
Provenance
- Shelf
- Press coverage
- Page
- 20
- Issue
- Volume 8, number 6
- Byline
- Unsigned, headed "Courtesy of Mark Goldes"; summarising Tony Edwards in the London Sunday Times
- Patent office record
- newenergytimes.com →
- Rights
- Fusion Facts is copyright 1996 by the Fusion Information Center, Inc. The archive reproduces only the item about Meyer, as a record of what was printed at the time, and claims nothing in it; the whole issue is in the Center's archive at New Energy Times, linked above.
- Caption
- Fusion Facts, December 1996, page 20, the item as printed.
- Citation
- Fusion Facts, Salt Lake City, Volume 8, number 6, December 1996, pp. 20, by Unsigned, headed "Courtesy of Mark Goldes"; summarising Tony Edwards in the London Sunday Times
- Publication
- Fusion Facts, Salt Lake City
- Transcription
- The page image of the New Energy Times copy of the issue, checked against its text layer.