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ive months ago, we reported that Pat Stockwell had co-signed a foreign sailor’s check for almost three thousand dollars – and was stuck having to pay the bank when the check turned out to be bogus.

Pat Stockwell last fall after he learned that a check he had co-signed for French sailor Pascal Ott was counterfeit. Ott refused to give him back all of the $2890. Police did not charge Ott and while Pat got a ruling in his favor in small claims court, Ott fled the country this winter.

Reaction to the story was swift. There was indignation that the $2980.42 check in question had been presented by the French crew of the sailboat, Primadonna. By then, the boat and crew had already become the subject of controversy for homesteading for a year in Oriental’s harbor and anchorage.

Then there were queries as to why local law enforcement didn’t pursue the bad check case – and restitution for Pat – more than it did.

Absent that, others asked how the community could help Pat, who had acted out of a generous impulse. A number of TownDock readers contacted us to ask to set up a fund so that folks could help Pat and his wife Laurie make up what they lost.

Primadonna in Oriental’s anchorage last fall. The boat and its French crew had homesteaded in Oriental’s harbor for over a year. In late September, Primadonna’s owner, Pascal Ott asked Pat Stockwell to co-sign a check for him. That generous impulse by the Provision Company’s manager to help a fellow sailor cost him three thousand dollars.

At the time, Pat Stockwell said he didn’t want any organized fundraising because he was trying to get all the money back from the man who owed it to him, Primadonna’s owner, Pascal Ott. (After the story went public, Ott returned $500 of the $2980 he made from the check Pat Stockwell co-signed.) Because local police wouldn’t take action, Pat Stockwell’s only recourse was to work his way through the small claims court system, which he did, incurring still more costs.

A judge ruled in Pat’s favor in early December. But by then, Primadonna had been towed from Oriental’s harbor to Morehead City. In Morehead, it would have still been within the reach of North Carolina’s small claims court system. Primadonna lingered only about a week there before its crew took their boat out of the country and out of the court’s jurisdiction.

Pascal Ott, in a photo taken last year in Oriental’s harbor where he had taken up residence. In September, Ott asked Pat Stockwell to co-sign a check for $2,980.42 and then refused to pay back that sum when the check turned out to be bogus. Stockwell had to pay First Citizens Bank. Many have asked how they could help make up the loss to Pat Stockwell.

Then in January came reports from Booby Cay in the Bahamas that the boat ended up on a reef there. In February there was yet another report — that Primadonna’s crew was deported to France for violating the Bahamian law about checking in when you enter their waters.

Without any police action against Primadonna’s crew for the bad check incident, Pat Stockwell’s only route left was to go to Small Claims Court in Bayboro in December. He won a ruling against Primadonna’s captain, but got no more money from Pascal Ott before Ott left the US and the arm of the court system.

With the Primadonna crew no longer in US waters, chances of Pat Stockwell and his wife, Laurie, ever getting full restitution grew dimmer. A few readers had that on their minds when they contacted TownDock after last week’s installment about the Bahamian deportation. Wasn’t it time, now, they said, to pass the hat for Pat so that he wouldn’t have to absorb the entire cost of his attempt to help a sailor in Oriental’s harbor?

Primadonna, the boat belonging to French sailors Pascal Ott and Monique Christmann, who were reportedly deported from the Bahamas this winter. Their boat remains grounded on a reef at Booby Cay, while back in Oriental, Pat Stockwell is still on the hook for some $1600 for the bad check he unwittingly co-signed on Ott’s behalf in the fall.

Pat Stockwell says that he’s gotten about $900 from people who just gave him money upon hearing of his plight last fall. There was also the partial restitution of $500 by Pascal Ott. That leaves about $1,600 that he is still out for the bogus check, (or what in French is called a cheque sans provision.)

If you would like to help him out, Pat Stockwell’s address is PO Box 466, Oriental, NC 28571

Some earlier stories about Primadonna and its crew:

• Have You Seen Primadonna? :: Dec 8, 2013

• Primadonna Has Left The Harbor :: Nov 12, 2013

• Letters: Reaction To Primadonna And The Bad Check Pay Back Sought :: Oct 10, 2013

• Local Man on The Hook For Boat In Anchorage :: Oct 8, 2013

• Letters: Primadonna’s Stay and Story :: Sep 6, 2013

• Shipping News: Primadonna – Arrested Departure :: July 24, 2013

• Letters: More On Oriental’s Anchorage – Some Solutions Suggested :: July 3, 2013

• Guest Columnist – Limit Stays In Anchorage – A Way To Welcome More Boats :: June 3, 2013

Posted Wednesday March 5, 2014 by Melinda Penkava