Gary Goodyear Continues To Deny Knowledge of Imagine Adoption Agency/Constant Energy Relationship

21 July 2009

Gary Goodyear Continues To Deny Knowledge of Imagine Adoption Agency/Constant Energy Relationship

No Involvement or Knowledge In Dubious Relationship

By David Terry

Goodyear At CRC-IRAP Press Conference

Goodyear: I Knew And I Know Nothing About This Situation

Speaking to a meeting which recognized Cambridge-based Atlantic Industries Limited and Upland Technologies as Canadian innovation leaders, Gary Goodyear continued to deflect questions regarding his knowledge of the unfolding situation at the Imagine Adoption Agency and his ownership of Constant Energy, a Cambridge-based rental company.

Constant Energy is one of the Agency’s creditors and clarification is being sought over Gary and Valerie Goodyear’s joint ownership of the company and its dealings with Imagine.

Citing conflict of interest concerns and asserting that he had no knowledge of any of the events leading up to Imagine’s bankruptcy filing, Mr Goodyear stated that he “could not and would not answer questions” related to either Imagine or Constant Energy. Referring to certain press releases published by BDO Dunwoody in respect to these matters, Mr Goodyear suggested that everything that merited publication was publically available and that anything else published was “stirring up trouble”.

In response to a question regarding Constant Energy, Mr Goodyear said that he didn’t know about it “even before when (he) was a chiropractor”.

Mr Goodyear asserted that the media should be focussed on the plight of the Ethiopian orphans who are at the epicentre of the storm surrounding Imagine’s bankruptcy and who may find themselves abandoned just when it appeared that new lives had been found for them with adoptive parents in Canada.

Showing several photographs of his wife, Valerie, with some of these children taken in Ethiopia, he said that this was the “real tragedy” of Imagine’s bankruptcy. He said that his wife has been “more distressed about these children than when her father died” and remains profoundly anxious for their well-being.

Mr Goodyear added that his wife along with 18 other employees of Imagine had been completely shocked and taken by surprise when news of the agency’s insolvency became public and which resulted in their loss of employment. “We can deal with the loss of a job” said Mr Goodyear, “but it is more difficult to deal with what may happen to these children”. “We are both devastated for these people”.

Mr Goodyear also to declined to comment on the management practices now being revealed at the Imagine Agency and referred such questions to his wife.

For the present at least Mr Goodyear’s involvement in this triangle suggests that he continues to appropriately comply with the legal requirements of his position and that he has no prior knowledge of Imagine and Constant Energy’s history. The position of his wife Valerie is a little more unclear, however. Was Mrs Goodyear as co-owner of Constant Energy aware of the extent and length of Imagine’s default to the property company of which she is co-owner? What were the three Cambridge properties rented by Imagine used for? Does she reflectively have any comment with regard to the management practices at Imagine which appear to have led to the Agency’s bankruptcy?

The tangled web woven by the Imagine Adoption Agency’s bankruptcy is increasingly murky. BDO Dunwoody, as the agency’s trustee has promised that their findings will be published as they become known. In particular BDO has recently expressed some optimism that the status of the 50 children in Ethiopia would be satisfactorily resolved. This would certainly bring relief not only to their adoptive parents but also to Mr and Mrs Goodyear whose anxieties and concern for these children is so great.

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