# Yet Another Plagiariser! (Edited from my original post)



## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

I just read today about another plagiariser, one even more blatant than Karl Jones, the man who stole two of my books in August of this year.

Please spread the word, so author Jerri Hines can make sure this thief is exposed. (I've never actually had need to go back into a previous post of mine to update on someone else's experience. Wasn't sure if I was meant to remove my original post. I haven't, but I've drawn a line between this, edited post, and my original).

http://romanticpicks.wordpress.com/2014/12/08/the-cry-of-plagiarism/

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The 'author' who has only managed to find the energy to change the names in the two of 'his' books that he purports to have written, has stolen the rest of my words wholesale.

I've reported him to Amazon.

But I checked him out after a reader was kind enough to tip me off, and I discovered 'his' work not only takes up four pages on his author page, but also extends across a fair few genres. It might be a good idea for others on these boards to check him out and see if he's also stolen their work.

His name is Karl Jones. He has re-named my series The 'O'Malley series. He seems to have several series on the go. As MY Joe Rafferty would say: 'nice little earner'.


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## TonyWrites (Oct 1, 2013)

"If Stephen Ambrose could do it, I can do it!" seems to be thought of plagiarizers like this dude.
Isn't there a way Kindle authors can prevent such "cut and paste" rip off artists from copying their work?


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## Diane Patterson (Jun 17, 2012)

You'd think Amazon could apply TurnItIn to the books uploaded to their site.


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## TonyWrites (Oct 1, 2013)

Diane Patterson said:


> You'd think Amazon could apply TurnItIn to the books uploaded to their site.


What is TurnItIn?


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## I&#039;m a Little Teapot (Apr 10, 2014)

Ugh, a pox on him. A very itchy pox. 

(I don't know how people like this live with themselves.)


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## meh (Apr 18, 2013)

Wow, did you register your copyright?  I'd go after him, especially with that ranking. Get that money back.


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## 90daysnovel (Apr 30, 2012)

judygoodwin said:


> Wow, did you register your copyright? I'd go after him, especially with that ranking. Get that money back.


She doesn't need to have registered copyright - she's based in England.


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## Diane Patterson (Jun 17, 2012)

TonyWrites said:


> What is TurnItIn?


A service used by just about every university (and quite a few high schools, I think) to analyze student papers and see if they've appeared anywhere before -- like, from a previous student, or a student at another college, or a term paper mill that churns out papers for pay.

I *think* students are allowed to argue that they can plagiarize from themselves (ie, use parts of a paper they themselves wrote), but I'm not sure about that.

That Amazon (and Scribd, which has no problem uploading pirated stuff) can't use similar technology seems at the very least lazy. Amazon knows discoverability and keywords -- it should start putting that to use.


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## dotx (Nov 4, 2010)

Diane Patterson said:


> You'd think Amazon could apply TurnItIn to the books uploaded to their site.


I love your covers.

So sorry to hear this happened. Hopefully Amazon will act quickly.


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

Congrats on being plagiarised.  I don't mean I am glad it happened but they only do that to big authors.


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## Kwalker (Aug 23, 2012)

I am so sorry you are dealing with this. ((big hugs.))


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## 77071 (May 15, 2014)

well i'm gonna check out YOUR stories now!


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## WG McCabe (Oct 13, 2012)

Dayum. Sorry this happened to you. Wonder who else this scumbag has ripped off?


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## WG McCabe (Oct 13, 2012)

next post


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## WG McCabe (Oct 13, 2012)

FYI, Karl Jones is also a member here. I KNEW that author pic looked familiar.


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## WG McCabe (Oct 13, 2012)

From the Book Bazaar.
http://www.kboards.com/index.php/topic,186828.msg2634625.html#msg2634625


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## TonyWrites (Oct 1, 2013)

Diane Patterson said:


> A service used by just about every university (and quite a few high schools, I think) to analyze student papers and see if they've appeared anywhere before -- like, from a previous student, or a student at another college, or a term paper mill that churns out papers for pay.
> 
> I *think* students are allowed to argue that they can plagiarize from themselves (ie, use parts of a paper they themselves wrote), but I'm not sure about that.
> 
> That Amazon (and Scribd, which has no problem uploading pirated stuff) can't use similar technology seems at the very least lazy. Amazon knows discoverability and keywords -- it should start putting that to use.


Many thanks, Diane.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

WG McCabe said:


> FYI, Karl Jones is also a member here. I KNEW that author pic looked familiar.


Wow. I wonder if he plagiarized all of his other books from members here.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

WG McCabe said:


> next post


Why did you edit this post? The person mentioned is also a member here. It's all v odd.


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## WG McCabe (Oct 13, 2012)

I looked into something a bit more and decided to leave that name out of it for the moment.


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

Doggone it, hardnutt! I've been reading your first Rafferty book and greatly enjoying it. It really makes me furious that this &*&%%*#* plagiarized your book.

I thought Amazon had crawler bots that went around the Internet looking for blocks of text identical to those in different Kindle books. Whatever it is, I hope that you will be able to use all available technology to defeat this man's theft.


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

WG McCabe said:


> From the Book Bazaar.
> http://www.kboards.com/index.php/topic,186828.msg2634625.html#msg2634625


Yeah, there's the smoking gun, complete with fingerprints!  I was going to post a reply on that thread to provide a link to this thread, but there was no "reply" button. Can you not post replies in Book Bazaar? I've never used that board so I don't know.


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## markhealy (Jun 5, 2014)

That's pathetic, I hope this guy gets what's coming to him.


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## Morgan Curtis (May 15, 2012)

His thread in the Book Bazaar has been locked.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Diane Patterson said:


> You'd think Amazon could apply TurnItIn to the books uploaded to their site.


I've never heard of Turnitin, either. Sounds like an excellent idea for Amazon to use it.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

judygoodwin said:


> Wow, did you register your copyright? I'd go after him, especially with that ranking. Get that money back.


I wondered about American copyright, Judy. Maybe it's too late to register it after the event? I'll investigate.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

dotx said:


> I love your covers.
> 
> So sorry to hear this happened. Hopefully Amazon will act quickly.


Wow! Thank you. I did the covers myself so I've always assumed (not having any graphics training) that they might not be quite the thing. After your kind words I shall regard them with a quiet pride. I'd still like to get them all custom-designed, but with fifteen in the series that's a financial demand beyond my pocket at the moment. Maybe I'd get a discount for quantity?

Yes. I wrote to Amazon as soon as I learned of this man's deception, giving chapter and verse. It was just his bad luck that the lady who spotted his rip off is not only a fan of mine but also an Emeritus Professor of Law!


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

cinisajoy said:


> Congrats on being plagiarised. I don't mean I am glad it happened but they only do that to big authors.


Cinesajoy, you raised a smile. And a hollow laugh. Alas, while I might have a big back-list the only other 'big' thing about me is the size of my overdraft. :-(

But I know what you mean. At least this rip off merchant found my work worthy of theft. One has to take a small pride in that. I think.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

HSh said:


> well i'm gonna check out YOUR stories now!


Thank you. Hope you like them. Hope you BUY them! Then I'll have something with which to appease my horrible bank manager who's been busy lately penning some of his less welcome missives. :-(


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Bluebonnet said:


> Doggone it, hardnutt! I've been reading your first Rafferty book and greatly enjoying it. It really makes me furious that this &*&%%*#* plagiarized your book.
> 
> I thought Amazon had crawler bots that went around the Internet looking for blocks of text identical to those in different Kindle books. Whatever it is, I hope that you will be able to use all available technology to defeat this man's theft.


Aah! thank you, BB! Give the man his due, though: he's enabled me to discover my books have one or two fans on these boards, so he can't be all bad.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Thanks all for your sympathy and concern. I hope none of you has found your books listed amongst this guy's rip offs.

I'd think about suing him, but a man this devious is likely to do a runner if I get my solicitor to slap a writ on him and I'll be the one left with the large legal bill to pay. 

Or perhaps I'm just being cowardly. Charles Dickins's writing has filled me with a suitable horror of 'going to law'. And I can't say my own experience of the legal profession has encouraged a more optimistic outlook. I'm currently involved in some legal business and if I've had to send various documents once, I've had to send them three times. Inefficient? The word must have been invented for 'em!

With apologies to the lovely legal lady who gave me the tip off.


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## going going gone (Jun 4, 2013)

How awful!

How'd you discover this? 

As a new author at Amazon, I have to say, I find it terribly worrying. They have the ability to search for plagiarism in ways I don't.  And they'd have the ability to publish this person's real name and home address, too, based on his banking information, which I do wish they'd do.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Hardnutt,

For book #4, the description on the page in the US store says it's book #3?

The Hanging Tree

Betsy


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## Chris Northern (Jan 20, 2011)

Wow.  

Just when I think nothing anyone can do will ever surprise me again. I think I'd be about 25,000 feet and still climbing on a tail of flaming incandescent rage. I'm pretty much there by proxy. I would wish this not have happened to you, or anyone.

For the non-writers, some few of whom may not be immediately empathise, imagine at the end of your working day someone else gets paid, the tips, and the praise for a job well done.

Dear Amazon, please deposit one tonne of bricks on the head of the purp'.

I feel that Amazon has a duty of care, and the resources to deal with this kind of thing on behalf of the authors from which they make a very regular buck. All outlets, actually, but as the largest and most successful it might serve amazon well to take a lead, and strongly discourage this from happening in future. At all.


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## Mr. RAD (Jan 4, 2011)

Here's his Twitter profile if anyone wants to, well, you know, tell the world he's been outed as a cheat.

https://twitter.com/karljonesauthor

(I found it via his Amazon author page.)


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## unkownwriter (Jun 22, 2011)

WG McCabe said:


> FYI, Karl Jones is also a member here. I KNEW that author pic looked familiar.


Mostly posting in the Bazaar, an old thread about tagging, and two or three other threads from the last couple of years. Not really active in a writing community devoted to self-publishers, would you say? But then, I guess he's very busy, writing day and night as he does.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

cadle-sparks said:


> How awful!
> 
> How'd you discover this?
> 
> As a new author at Amazon, I have to say, I find it terribly worrying. They have the ability to search for plagiarism in ways I don't. And they'd have the ability to publish this person's real name and home address, too, based on his banking information, which I do wish they'd do.


Cadle, one of my readers emailed me about this man.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Chris Northern said:


> Wow.
> 
> Just when I think nothing anyone can do will ever surprise me again. I think I'd be about 25,000 feet and still climbing on a tail of flaming incandescent rage. I'm pretty much there by proxy. I would wish this not have happened to you, or anyone.
> 
> ...


Chris, I suppose I'm of the fatalistic breed. Just as well really, as so far, the month of July has been pretty grim for various reasons, not just this man's antics.

Roll on August!


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Sheila_Guthrie said:


> Mostly posting in the Bazaar, an old thread about tagging, and two or three other threads from the last couple of years. Not really active in a writing community devoted to self-publishers, would you say? But then, I guess he's very busy, writing day and night as he does.


Lol! Poor guy. As you say, Sheila, I don't suppose he has the time. Ripping off the work of others has to be a full-time occupation.


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## MorganKegan (Jan 10, 2013)

I just checked this guy's "work" out. Wow, talking about brazen. I had to upvote the two reviews that pointed out that they were rip-offs. It'll be interesting to see just what Amazon's response is, and how long it takes. Here's to hoping any unpaid money from the sales of those two plagiarized books goes to Geraldine. I wonder, does he have his plagiarisms up on other sites, like B&N?

This guy's rep is shot now. Time to come up with a new pen name, I suppose. It's too much to hope that he'll be deterred for long.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

I find it ironic that "Karl Jones" is the name of a researcher with an expertise in combatting student plagiarism.

http://ecet.ecs.uni-ruse.bg/cst05/Docs/cp/sIV/IV.8.pdf

Betsy


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## Chris Northern (Jan 20, 2011)

hardnutt said:


> Chris, I suppose I'm of the fatalistic breed. Just as well really, as so far, the month of July has been pretty grim for various reasons, not just this man's antics.
> 
> Roll on August!


True, this is no job for the feint hearted or the easily disheartened. I hope the grimness abates and for you August is a sweet fun time in all ways.


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## jackz4000 (May 15, 2011)

He has 87 books on Amazon right now. Probably all plagiarized.


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## dmac (Jun 23, 2014)

Good grief. Do you think Amazon will do more than just ban his account? I am assuming they will ban his account. Who does this guy think he is? He even has a blog where he wrote this:

"There's nothing like keeping yourself busy, I seem to be great at that, especially when it comes to my writing. Right now I'm editing the 2nd book in my O'Malley Mysteries series, working on an historical action/adventure book adapted from H Rider Haggard's King Solomon's Mines, working on an historical erotic espionage novel and, since I can't seem to settle down to the next Donna Harp book I'm working on the planning for a new book, a kidnap thriller. With a bit of luck I might get some of these finished in the next year or so, lol. "

http://ksjsrandomworld.blogspot.co.uk/

My God. The brass ones on some people.


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## MorganKegan (Jan 10, 2013)

Yep, I bet that whole "steal book, search-and-replace character names, publish plagiarized book" cycle really burns up the midnight oil.


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## ricola (Mar 3, 2014)

He's still advertising your books on Nook.


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

David S. said:


> In his defense, he has some excellent covers.


With all due respect, David, I don't think there is any valid defense for a crook like him.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Has Amazon replied yet? I wonder if they can recoup their royalties?


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## Paul Huxley (Feb 27, 2014)

I was as scandalised by this sorry affair as the rest of the Writer's Cafe regulars so I did a little Google snooping and came up with some interesting results.

The Karl Jones in question would appear to live in Bristol, UK. A search for a person by that name in that city comes up with several news stories pertaining to criminal offenses which I won't list just in case it's the wrong person. You can do the search yourselves. I'll report back when I've found out more and if indeed this person is the one and the same.
So far several other sources point towards this being the right guy.  If this is true then you might not have to worry about further works being plagiarized.

If not, well the guy's still an utter @#?&£%.


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## Mandy (Dec 27, 2009)

At least he's getting reamed in his reviews for the series. I wonder if he'll respond.


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## dmac (Jun 23, 2014)

Paul Huxley said:


> I was as scandalised by this sorry affair as the rest of the Writer's Cafe regulars so I did a little Google snooping and came up with some interesting results.
> 
> The Karl Jones in question would appear to live in Bristol, UK. A search for a person by that name in that city comes up with several news stories pertaining to criminal offenses which I won't list just in case it's the wrong person. You can do the search yourselves. I'll report back when I've found out more and if indeed this person is the one and the same.
> So far several other sources point towards this being the right guy. If this is true then you might not have to worry about further works being plagiarized.
> ...


I love the Internet. 

I have added my own upvotes to make sure everyone knows about his obvious theft. Just wow. The brazeness. Then bragging about "writing" it on his blog. Wow.


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## Paul Huxley (Feb 27, 2014)

If you give me a couple more minutes to verify who I think this author is, then there is no way that he's going to respond. He might be in more trouble than mere plagiarism.


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## Paul Huxley (Feb 27, 2014)

Okay, I'm pretty sure this is the guy.

http://letteschat.com/2014/07/17/karl-jones-the-pedophile-in-our-midst/

http://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/news/11350120.Convicted_paedophile_admits_sexually_abusing_four_year_old_Bradford_girl/


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## Mandy (Dec 27, 2009)




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## Paul Huxley (Feb 27, 2014)

Yup....

Didn't see that one coming.

It goes without saying that his crimes are terrible and fortunately he has been arrested and convicted. There has been a massive operation in the UK over the last year and recently 650 people have been arrested in conjunction with similar crimes. This is not a forum about any of that of course so I'll say a little something about how it pertains to this thread.

At least this stealing will stop immediately and that the person in question has been locked up. Unfortunately this makes it very hard to do anything about suing him or reclaiming owed monies. It should make it easier for Amazon to remove his entire account.

Not much more to say really.


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## Paul Huxley (Feb 27, 2014)

Sorry for the burst of posts but I found another interesting page.

http://thelookingglassofcarrollbryant.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/goodreads-pedo-alert-karl-jones.html


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

Paul Huxley said:


> Sorry for the burst of posts but I found another interesting page.
> 
> http://thelookingglassofcarrollbryant.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/goodreads-pedo-alert-karl-jones.html


  Thanks for finding that information about Karl Jones' pedo convictions. This is awful.

The blogs and articles are about his pedo stuff. I didn't see any articles about his plagiarism. Maybe someone with a high traffic blog could write about hardnutt's experience with Jones' plagiarism. I wish the Passive Guy would pick up the story -- he has lots of readers. How does Passive Guy select topics to blog about? Does there have to be an article published on some other website/newspaper first, or does he start some of his own topics? If hardnutt contacted PG, wonder if he would be interested in blogging about her experience.

Of course it's up to hardnutt what she wants to do about publicizing this theft (in addition to her posts here on kboards). What concerns me is that Jones has 87 other e-books (according to someone who posted further back in this thread), so it's possible that he has plagiarized dozens of other authors' books too. All the authors he plagiarized should be informed about it so they can take action with Amazon and other retailers, and get his stolen books taken down.

Did I misunderstand? I thought he was in jail? If this is his twitter, he was posting 33 minutes ago, promoting his book "Shattered." (That was one of the novels the Karl Jones we are discussing has published.) How is he using twitter if he's in jail? Sorry, I'm just getting confused about the status of his pedo conviction now.

https://twitter.com/karljonesauthor


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## Debbie Bennett (Mar 25, 2011)

He's apparently on bail awaiting sentencing in August.


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

DebBennett said:


> He's apparently on bail awaiting sentencing in August.


Thanks!


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## Kallie (Sep 17, 2010)

DebBennett said:


> He's apparently on bail awaiting sentencing in August.


They allowed this man to post bail? *walks away shaking head in disgust*


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## dianasg (Jan 8, 2010)

It appears that one of the other books he published under his own name describes the violent rape and murder of two girls - and the suspect in the book is an author. 

If this is another plagiarized work, I hope that word gets out and the original author is made aware. If I wrote a book about such a crime, I'd be horrified to learn that it's fodder for the fantasies - and profits - of a man like this. 

It appears that it probably IS plagiarized - one Amazon review complains about his poor proofreading, and the way he calls a character named Emma "Danielle." The book is called Shattered.


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## Zelah Meyer (Jun 15, 2011)

Very sorry to hear that your books were stolen.

I really hope Amazon shuts down his account over this.

As for his other crimes ...  

Thinking about it - if Amazon DON'T shut his account down over this they've got a potential PR issue on their hands when other titles are recognised by their rightful owners.  His other crimes would make them allowing him to continue what he's doing into something unsavourily newsworthy that would get a fair bit of coverage.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

SevenDays said:


> Ugh, a pox on him. A very itchy pox.
> 
> (I don't know how people like this live with themselves.)


one dolla at a time


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## RockyGrede (Apr 19, 2013)

Hope this gets sorted out.

Turnitin is the way forward. I remember the programme vividly from my University days.


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## dmac (Jun 23, 2014)

DebBennett said:


> He's apparently on bail awaiting sentencing in August.


Apparently he spent his time waiting for sentencing blogging, stealing books, and publishing them on Amazon.

Amazing.


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## Mandy (Dec 27, 2009)

RockyGrede said:


> Hope this gets sorted out.
> 
> Turnitin is the way forward. I remember the programme vividly from my University days.


Is TurnItIn the program that lets professors run your paper to see if it's been plagiarized? If so, I'm pretty sure one of my English professors used it. My first paper came back with a 3% plagiarism rate (unavoidable) and it still bugged me enough to bring it down to 1%.


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## RockyGrede (Apr 19, 2013)

Some of the books are co-authored.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Wow on the pedophile aspect. 

A less serious aside, every freaking time I'm in a bundle and keep the title published on its own, I have to deal with an Amazon email about duplicate content and prove I have the rights. Makes one wonder whether they've sent him the same and then accepted his statement that it was his - yet didn't contact the other authors with the same content. Seems like all amazon is good for in the copyright department is sending verify your rights emails to the actual copyright holders.


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## unkownwriter (Jun 22, 2011)

This guy is disgusting. I don't know what kind of sentencing you have in the UK for this kind of crime (the rape of a four-year-old girl), but it won't be nearly long enough.

Maybe he plagiarized those books because he needed easy money. He certainly wasn't burning the midnight oil writing, but probably looking at dirty pictures of innocent children and plotting how to get hold of the next one. 

I checked one book (the SF one, something about a brother) and it came back as not stolen, but who knows how accurate that was. This person's account should be removed, and any future attempts to join blocked.


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## RockyGrede (Apr 19, 2013)

Mandy said:


> Is TurnItIn the program that lets professors run your paper to see if it's been plagiarized? If so, I'm pretty sure one of my English professors used it. My first paper came back with a 3% plagiarism rate (unavoidable) and it still bugged me enough to bring it down to 1%.


Yes. I know there were a few cases where students were caught and kicked from the university for plagiarising. If I remember correctly, one student plagiarised something from a different language, then translated it into English and passed it off as his own. Clever, but he still got caught.


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## RhondaW (Mar 31, 2012)

That is just sick. Sure hope Amazon shuts him down quickly!

I found his G+ page too https://plus.google.com/100065154671713134704


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

WG McCabe said:


> Is he Michelle Hughes as well? Check out the one star review and follow-up comment to his book, A Brother's Debt on Amazon.


It's all v odd. That comment is so strange. Michelle Hughes *is* Tears of Crimson Publishing. Pretending to be signed to a publishing deal to your own imprint that you created and run and only publishes your books? And replying for Karl Jones as though she were him? There isn't enough wtf for the things in this thread.

Michelle's also a member here. Perhaps she can shed some light her comment on his book and her "relationship" with the Karl.


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## mariehallwrites (Mar 14, 2013)

Wow. That's really all I have to say. From bad to worse. 

Yuck. 

Now I want to rinse my eyes out with bleach.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Has Amazon replied yet? I wonder if they can recoup their royalties?


Jan, I contacted amazon on Friday evening (UK time). It's now 12.50 on Sunday morning and I have yet to receive an email from either Amazon or Smashwords who also stock his rip offs. Not even an acknowledgement. I can only presume they're researching both my writing history and his.

They shouldn't need to look far to research into mine, as I have, several times, had to provide them with letters from my various ex-publishers, wherein were granted the return of my rights in these books (this man's were still on the shelves when I looked a few hours ago).


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

MorganKegan said:


> I just checked this guy's "work" out. Wow, talking about brazen. I had to upvote the two reviews that pointed out that they were rip-offs. It'll be interesting to see just what Amazon's response is, and how long it takes. Here's to hoping any unpaid money from the sales of those two plagiarized books goes to Geraldine. I wonder, does he have his plagiarisms up on other sites, like B&N?
> 
> This guy's rep is shot now. Time to come up with a new pen name, I suppose. It's too much to hope that he'll be deterred for long.


Seconded on the unpaid money coming to me! And yes, he also publishes via Smashwords, so he's available wherever he can make a shekel.

Please, everyone, tell all your author friends about this man. He seems so 'prolific' (as a crook, anyway), that I cannot only be the only author he's done this to. I think you all need to check through his substantial body of work in various genres to see who else he's ripped off.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Paul Huxley said:


> Okay, I'm pretty sure this is the guy....
> 
> http://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/news/11350120.Convicted_paedophile_admits_sexually_abusing_four_year_old_Bradford_girl/


The picture doesn't look like those of the author










ETA - so wait - are these supposed to be the same guy 1 year apart? http://ukpaedos-exposed.com/2013/09/09/karl-jones-bournemouth/


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

With regard to this man's possible 'other activities', another of my readers sent me a link to the UK and Eire Paedophile Register, but I thought it prudent not to mention it as I had no way of knowing if it was the one and the same guy.

If he's truly the appalling human being he seems to be, HE might just end up suing ME! And using my tax-payer, government-funded money, to pay his legal costs. I, on the other hand, would, of course, have to fund my own.

Entirely possible in this screwed-up modern world.

I vote a return to 'Victorian Values'. But what am I saying? As I recall, they were a tad too fond of little girls,  too...

And as for the man mentioned in the stories getting bail for his assaults; it's pretty typical here in the UK. Sometimes, I think half the judiciary has a similar perverted taste for the forbidden. It would explain the leniency so many of these men receive from the courts.


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## dmac (Jun 23, 2014)

I am sure that, like most businesses, queries on the weekends will take longer to hear back from.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Chris Northern said:


> True, this is no job for the feint hearted or the easily disheartened. I hope the grimness abates and for you August is a sweet fun time in all ways.


 + xxxx


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> I find it ironic that "Karl Jones" is the name of a researcher with an expertise in combatting student plagiarism.
> 
> http://ecet.ecs.uni-ruse.bg/cst05/Docs/cp/sIV/IV.8.pdf
> 
> Betsy


Betsy, your impish sense of humour always manages to raise a smile.


----------



## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

MorganKegan said:


> I just checked this guy's "work" out. Wow, talking about brazen. I had to upvote the two reviews that pointed out that they were rip-offs. It'll be interesting to see just what Amazon's response is, and how long it takes. Here's to hoping any unpaid money from the sales of those two plagiarized books goes to Geraldine. I wonder, does he have his plagiarisms up on other sites, like B&N?
> 
> This guy's rep is shot now. Time to come up with a new pen name, I suppose. It's too much to hope that he'll be deterred for long.


PS, Morgan. Thanks for the uplink.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Blimey! I've sure raised a shit-storm here!

1500 views and counting... And so many comments that I've had to hit the brandy to keep up with them all!

I only anticipated a few words of sympathy and a quick check that this guy hadn't plagiarised anyone else's books.

Contact The Passive Guy! Dare I? Perhaps so. He can only reject my offering. Since turning indie, getting a rejection would be quite the novelty.


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## CEMartin2 (May 26, 2012)

It's not just selling the books... this guy's been interviewed about the books he's "written"

Man, I am so going to use his name as a redshirt in my next novel....


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

hardnutt said:


> Blimey! I've sure raised a [crap]-storm here!
> 
> 1500 views and counting... And so many comments that I've had to hit the brandy to keep up with them all!
> 
> ...


I think it would be worth trying, but it would be better to wait until you get some kind of response from Amazon. That might be the first thing PG would want to know after hearing about your situation: how did Amazon react to your complaint?

I hope Amazon will respond to you soon.


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## Mandy (Dec 27, 2009)

Has anyone found a definite photo of the author? For the sake of this thread, I hope the author and the guy listed on the registry are the same person.


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## CEMartin2 (May 26, 2012)

Bluebonnet said:


> I think it would be worth trying, but it would be better to wait until you get some kind of response from Amazon. That might be the first thing PG would want to know after hearing about your situation: how did Amazon react to your complaint?
> 
> I hope Amazon will respond to you soon.


Amazon's on it... he only has 44 titles up now. Someone above said he had 87. They're whittling his punk ass down to size...


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Folks,

I've been away all day and have just seen the thread since I posted this morning.  We're going to be discussing this some more in Admin.  

Please, let's stick to what is known for sure--which is that the book in question is indeed the same (except for changed names and some formatting differences) as Geraldine's.  Being "pretty sure" of something is not good enough when someone is being accused of the other crimes mentioned here.

Hopefully, if any other authors' books have been copied by the same person, that will come to light.

Geraldine, hopefully you'll hear back from Amazon soon--and also from Smashwords.

Betsy
KB Mod


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## LettesChat (Jul 20, 2014)

Dear Authors,

I was contacted by one of the members here, trying to clarify if Karl Jones is the same Karl Jones as the confessed pedophile in the UK. I can't tell you how shocked I was to find out that not only is this slime a pedophile but a plagiarist as well.

Jones was a member of an exclusive writing group I was a part of. I was very close to him and designed all of his book covers at one time. I trusted him implicitly and so did the others in the group, including his girlfriend and her daughter, whom he just admitted to molesting.

Previously we did not feel comfortable in disclosing his name because he was able to beat charges. Authorities found THOUSANDS...yes THOUSANDS AND THOUSANDS of images of child pornography on his computer. I am a podcaster and I have produced two shows about this monster. Now that he has confessed, some of us in the group have made it our mission to bring him down. Here is the link to my latest blog along with links from another one of the group members and the woman he betrayed the most.

I loved and respected this guy. I can attest that the picture you posted of him, most definitely IS he (he's gained a lot of weight, but that is definitely Karl Jones). We were FRIENDS.

...and I too had a young daughter at the time. Thank GOD we are oceans apart. May he rot.

~ Carlette

http://letteschat.com/2014/07/17/karl-jones-the-pedophile-in-our-midst/


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## Mandy (Dec 27, 2009)

LettesChat said:


> Dear Authors,
> 
> I was contacted by one of the members here, trying to clarify if Karl Jones is the same Karl Jones as the confessed pedophile in the UK. I can't tell you how shocked I was to find out that not only is this slime a pedophile but a plagiarist as well.
> 
> ...


As a mom of three kids, my sympathies are with you. It would sicken me, too, if I found out I had close ties with someone like that. We still don't know 100% for sure that the Karl you knew is the same Karl who's the author of the plagiarized books, so I agree with Betsy - those are very serious allegations and there's no room for "pretty sure."


----------



## WG McCabe (Oct 13, 2012)

Monique said:


> It's all v odd. That comment is so strange. Michelle Hughes *is* Tears of Crimson Publishing. Pretending to be signed to a publishing deal to your own imprint that you created and run and only publishes your books? And replying for Karl Jones as though she were him? There isn't enough wtf for the things in this thread.
> 
> Michelle's also a member here. Perhaps she can shed some light her comment on his book and her "relationship" with the Karl.


That's what I referred to last night and deleted. But yeah, that's amazingly odd.


----------



## Mark Bannion (Jul 8, 2014)

There isn't enough  for this thread


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## Gennita Low (Dec 13, 2012)

There must be more than six degrees for all these connections!!! Jaw-dropping.


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## Sally C (Mar 31, 2011)

> Is he Michelle Hughes as well? Check out the one star review and follow-up comment to his book, A Brother's Debt on Amazon


I found this on the Tears of Crimson website: Hi everyone, this is Karl here, I thought it was time to introduce myself here. I am Michelle's new partner, and I'm pleased to have been welcomed to Tears of Crimson; this partnership is very new but has already proven to be very fruitful on many fronts.

http://www.tearsofcrimson.com/2012/09/hello-tears-of-crimson.html


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## bigc (Dec 4, 2010)

This guy is a real scumbag.......did you know Karl Jones is a convicted paedophile too?

http://brydenlloyd.wix.com/scribe#!THE-FINAL-BETRAYAL/c1czl/BB948288-763A-456E-A3C5-FC54E787E799


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

If you read the entire thread, you'll find this is already being discussed, bigc.

Betsy
KB Mod


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## kcmay (Jul 14, 2010)

The good news (on the pedophilia front) is that he changed his plea yesterday and his 4-year-old victim would not have to testify against him in court.
http://diamondsdarling.wordpress.com/2014/07/19/so-gobsmacked/


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## Mel Comley (Oct 13, 2010)

I can confirm it is the same guy. I meet him through the Amazon forums and been a FB friend with him for three-four years, until I heard about the court case last year. Dumped him pretty darn quick. :-(

he used to say he was envious of my success, just going over there now to see if any of my books are affected by this.


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## Chris Northern (Jan 20, 2011)

That's all pretty grim. Throw the book at him.

Well, someone had to say it.

I've long believed that child abuse should be a zero tolerance crime. Hang 'em and hang 'em high. Sadly, I am insufficiently agreed with in the halls of power. I can't imagine why (oh, wait, yes I can, but can't say as it strays into the field of politics).


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## Desmond X. Torres (Mar 16, 2013)

Mel Comley said:


> I can confirm it is the same guy. I meet him through the Amazon forums and been a FB friend with him for three-four years, until I heard about the court case last year. Dumped him pretty darn quick. :-(
> 
> he used to say he was envious of my success, just going over there now to see if any of my books are affected by this.


Let us know here, okay?


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Just thought I'd update you.

I reported this guy to Amazon on Friday evening, 18 July. It's now Sunday afternoon, 1.50 p m (both UK time), and I have still to receive any kind of response from Amazon, not even an acknowledgement (same with Smashwords, though, to be fair, I only contacted them yesterday).

Yesterday I also contacted Draft2Digital, thinking it likely this man, once he's booted off Amazon and Smashwords, might try his luck elsewhere with a new name, new series name and new covers. A word  to the wise, I thought. No response from  them either.

I can only assume they have less experienced weekend staff on duty and they thought it better to await the return of senior colleagues on Monday.

I checked earlier and this Karl Jones's books are still available on Amazon's shelves, though I didn't check if their numbers had reduced as was stated above.

I'll let you know what happens when the working week starts.


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## I&#039;m a Little Teapot (Apr 10, 2014)

I'm a really horrible person (okay, only when it comes to cretins like this), so I'd probably pass this plagiarism/theft info onto his local PD, too.


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## JeanneM (Mar 21, 2011)

Hardnutt, he has your stolen books up on Goodreads too. You might want to notify them as well.  So sorry this happened to you.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

JeanneM said:


> Hardnutt, he has your stolen books up on Goodreads too. You might want to notify them as well. So sorry this happened to you.


Thanks for letting me know, Jeanne. I'll get on to Goodreads.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

So sorry this happened to you.

As a public service, maybe you should warn *The Passive Voice* as well.


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## Mel Comley (Oct 13, 2010)

He belongs to a Goodreads group of readers, I've just shared this post with the admin of the group, Geraldine. Sorry it has happened to you. :-(


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## NothingToSeeHere... (Jul 26, 2013)

I do not consent to the new TOS, and do not give my consent by posting and maintaining my membership here.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Andrew Ashling said:


> So sorry this happened to you.
> 
> As a public service, maybe you should warn *The Passive Voice* as well.


Thanks, Andrew. Yes, I will. Although it was earlier suggested that I wait to contact THE PASSIVE GUY until I received a response from Amazon, perhaps he would like to check this guy out in the interim.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

SevenDays said:


> I'm a really horrible person (okay, only when it comes to cretins like this), so I'd probably pass this plagiarism/theft info onto his local PD, too.


Good idea. Thanks for the suggestion. I'll do that.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Mel Comley said:


> He belongs to a Goodreads group of readers, I've just shared this post with the admin of the group, Geraldine. Sorry it has happened to you. :-(


Thanks, Mel.


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## Michelle Hughes (Dec 12, 2011)

WG McCabe said:


> Is he Michelle Hughes as well? Check out the one star review and follow-up comment to his book, A Brother's Debt on Amazon.


He is most certainly not Michelle Hughes, as that is me. I had my own issues with Jones after a stupid decision on my part to allow him partial credit of my 10 Night Series for editing services. All of those books he claimed to have co-written. My entire series was pulled from shelves after his lies. Our original agreement was I would pay him 25% of royalties and his name would be on the book for his editing services. He decided after this book hit a bestseller list on Amazon that he deserved 50% instead of what we agreed on, and when I refused to pay that amount, he wrote Amazon telling them that I'd stolen his work. This was my statement to his claims http://bit.ly/1qTLBkO

Unfortunately, it doesn't surprise me that he's done it again. At the time I spoke with a lawyer and it would have cost me more money than I could afford to extradite him to the states to pursue this matter legally. I'm truly sorry that he's done this to another person. And I was a member of that writer's group, basically crucified by some of the same people now claiming what a horrible person he is. Thankfully I put him in the past and continued on to write new books which have done decently well. As far as the comment about Tears of Crimson. Yes it is my "personal" LLC for my books, and I chose to have all my work under it. Which also helps me for tax purposes.


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## LettesChat (Jul 20, 2014)

Geraldine, if you would like to come on my show and tell your story, please contact me at [email protected] - not to sensationalize this monster, but to let others know your story so they can start checking to make sure he hasn't stolen their work too. I can confirm Michelle's story as being true because she was a member of that small group I mentioned in my previous post.

By coming on the show, you will reach a wider audience. It's the one small thing I can offer, personally, to expose him.


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## Michelle Hughes (Dec 12, 2011)

hardnutt said:


> The 'author' who has only managed to find the energy to change the names in the two of 'his' books that he purports to have written, has stolen the rest of my words wholesale.
> 
> I've reported him to Amazon for unbelievably republishing the 10 Nights book ONCE again under a different title with only character changes. Amazing the audacity of this man.
> 
> Lessons (In Love, Lust and Life)


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Michelle Hughes said:


> hardnutt said:
> 
> 
> > The 'author' who has only managed to find the energy to change the names in the two of 'his' books that he purports to have written, has stolen the rest of my words wholesale.
> ...


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## 90daysnovel (Apr 30, 2012)

Geraldine,

There are free legal advice services available. Own It (http://www.own-it.org/) offer free legal advice to the creative industries. They're student led with qualified supervision. Alternatively, you might be able to get your local CAB/ CLAC to refer you to the Bar Pro Bono Unit which has some of the best barristers in London volunteering their time.

Or perhaps we could have a Kboards whip round? A tenner from all the lurkers in this thread would go a long way. This isn't a complicated dispute - not with decades between your version and his.

I've ordered a print copy of O'Malley #1 in case you need it as evidence - if you want it forwarded on, just pm.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

LATEST UPDATE

Just to let you know, I have now heard from Amazon and have forwarded to them copies of the letters from my original publishers in which they confirm that the rights in these books were returned to me.

I have also supplied chapter and verse about this issue as well as a link to this thread so they can learn more about  Karl Jones than they may wish to know.

I would again like to thank you all for your wonderful support over this issue. Your kindness is the only fond memory I will retain about this entire weekend. 

I've contacted Avon and Somerset police under whose auspices the City of Bristol comes, to let them know of the latest criminal behaviour of Karl Jones. And while plagiarism doesn't hold a candle for awfulness to some of his other apparent 'pursuits', maybe it will strengthen their elbow in some way. Hope so.

xx Geraldine


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

90daysnovel said:


> Geraldine,
> 
> There are free legal advice services available. Own It (http://www.own-it.org/) offer free legal advice to the creative industries. They're student led with qualified supervision. Alternatively, you might be able to get your local CAB/ CLAC to refer you to the Bar Pro Bono Unit which has some of the best barristers in London volunteering their time.
> 
> ...


Thanks for the links. And also for the suggestion of a whip round! To be honest, the sooner I am able to forget this man even existed, the happier I'll be. Pursuing him through the courts, possibly for months, even if financially-assisted to do so, is not something likely to fill my heart with heart with joy. From what Michelle Hughes said about her experiences with this man, he would seem to be extremely artful. I consider it more than likely that, if he has any loot for me to go after, he's probably concealed it very well. Better to just put it all down to experience and hope that it somehow enriches my writing.

But I greatly appreciate the offer.


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## Mandy (Dec 27, 2009)

Oh yuck. I just saw his author photo and he is indeed the same guy. Sickening. I'm sorry, Geraldine. If you do decide to pursue this in court, I'll gladly contribute to a chip-in. However this goes down, good luck!


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## Michelle Hughes (Dec 12, 2011)

Geraldine,

I'm so very sorry that you had to go through this experience.  I personally thought there were resources in place for authors when an act of this nature occurred too, but learned quickly that the monetary loss falls on us to prove a case.  Where you have a very big plus in your corner is that you released your work prior to him infringing upon your rights.  As far as getting recompense from Jones, I think you would probably only gain satisfaction from knowing you'd stopped him from doing this to another author.  An author alerted me to this board and had he not, I would not have known that he'd republished the copyright infringed book yet again, I'm very thankful for that information.

Please let me know how I can help get the word out about your work, Geraldine.  I hate to say this but what that person did to me made me very motivated in pursuing writing full time.  Whatever course of action you decide to take, I hope you know that you are an incredible writer, the fact that he could not write books on your scale is proof in the pudding for that.  Best of luck to you!

Truly,
Michelle


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Mandy said:


> Oh yuck. I just saw his author photo and he is indeed the same guy. Sickening. I'm sorry, Geraldine. If you do decide to pursue this in court, I'll gladly contribute to a chip-in. However this goes down, good luck!


Cheers, Mandy!


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Michelle Hughes said:


> Geraldine,
> 
> I'm so very sorry that you had to go through this experience. I personally thought there were resources in place for authors when an act of this nature occurred too, but learned quickly that the monetary loss falls on us to prove a case. Where you have a very big plus in your corner is that you released your work prior to him infringing upon your rights. As far as getting recompense from Jones, I think you would probably only gain satisfaction from knowing you'd stopped him from doing this to another author. An author alerted me to this board and had he not, I would not have known that he'd republished the copyright infringed book yet again, I'm very thankful for that information.
> 
> ...


Aw, shucks! Thanks, Michelle.

Personally, I don't feel this little arse-wipe will stop his plagiarism whatever action I decided to take against him. I'm not aware of any mechanism in place on Amazon that would stop him; even if they have something that would catch plagiarists like him, they seem disinclined to use it. And were they to became rather more macho in their pursuit of the Karl Jones-type plagiarist, this man seems artful and cunning enough to get around such barriers to the publication of others' work.

And if, as seems likely, he ends up in prison for his molestation of little girls, the prison authorities in the UK seem more than happy to provide prisoners with computer equipment (and other little luxuries that the rest of us have to fund ourselves) that enables them to continue to communicate with the outside world via the internet.

For now, the fact that so many fellow authors have down-voted his amazon reviews and revealed him for the plagiarist he is, will have to suffice.


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

Hardnutt, I hope you will consider taking advantage of the offers people have made here to help you publicize Karl Jones' plagiarism. Like you, I am afraid he will continue his plagiarism from prison, and steal from many other authors. He can get a friend on the outside to help him copy and upload other authors' books, even if the U.K. prison authorities restrict his Internet access. (Why would the friend help him? For a cut of the money, of course.) For example, convicted U.S. murderer Jodi Arias is not allowed to use the Internet, but she has a twitter account which is maintained by a friend. She tells the friend what she wants posted, and the friend accesses the twitter account and types the posts as instructed. Of course, Jones' plagiarism crimes pale before his child molestation crimes, but still I think the plagiarism should be publicized.

I wish this story would be publicized in blogs, social media and podcasts, and then picked up by one of the big media sites like Yahoo News or Huffington Post. Maybe they would be interested, especially since the story would be about a plagiarist who is also a convicted pedophile; it's newsworthy, in my opinion. There is no telling how many authors Jones has plagiarized. Also, how do we know that "Karl Jones" is the only name he's used as an author? Maybe more publicity would turn up a few KJ pen names. 

Hoping Amazon will respond to you on Monday. In case they will be responding to you on Monday from the U.S.: I am trying to figure out what Amazon's Monday business hours in the U.S. would be relative to your location. You're in the U.K., right?  At the time of this post, the U.K. is 5 hours ahead of me here on the U.S. east coast (Eastern Daylight Savings Time or EDT). Amazon's corporate office is in Seattle, U.S. State of Washington, which is on the west coast and is on Pacific Daylight Savings Time (PDT), 3 hours behind me. So if Amazon will respond from the Seattle office, they are 8 hours behind you. Well, this may be beside the point, since I don't know the location from which Amazon will respond: various locations in the U.S., or from their U.K. offices. I am interested in hearing what they will say about this issue.

It's a shame that authors have to be on guard for thieves like Karl Jones. Every dollar he takes from the sales of the books he plagiarized is a dollar out of the true authors' pockets. I wish Amazon and the other e-book retailers he used  could "claw back" the money they paid him, since he earned it by fraud and deception.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Bluebonnet said:


> Hardnutt, I hope you will consider taking advantage of the offers people have made here to help you publicize Karl Jones' plagiarism. Like you, I am afraid he will continue his plagiarism from prison, and steal from many other authors. He can get a friend on the outside to help him copy and upload other authors' books, even if the U.K. prison authorities restrict his Internet access. (Why would the friend help him? For a cut of the money, of course.) For example, convicted U.S. murderer Jodi Arias is not allowed to use the Internet, but she has a twitter account which is maintained by a friend. She tells the friend what she wants posted, and the friend accesses the twitter account and types the posts as instructed. Of course, Jones' plagiarism crimes pale before his child molestation crimes, but still I think the plagiarism should be publicized.
> 
> I wish this story would be publicized in blogs, social media and podcasts, and then picked up by one of the big media sites like Yahoo News or Huffington Post. Maybe they would be interested, especially since the story would be about a plagiarist who is also a convicted pedophile; it's newsworthy, in my opinion. There is no telling how many authors Jones has plagiarized. Also, how do we know that "Karl Jones" is the only name he's used as an author? Maybe more publicity would turn up a few KJ pen names.
> 
> ...


Hi BB,

I'm more than willing to publicise Jones's activities. Although my blog visitors can't be said to be massive in number, I'm next going to post about him with a link to this thread. The post will also go out to fb, twitter, linkedin, etc. I just haven't had the time, between one thing and another, to get the post written over the weekend (I'm actually supposed to be emailing out the large quantities of ebooks I offered in two separate giveaways on librarything, but I'm sure the recipients will understand the delay and that further exposure of Jones's behaviour is more urgent).

I have already contacted thepassivevoice and am awaiting a reply.

I've been offered, as you mentioned in this thread, two opportunities by fellow members of kboards to talk about this man and I've emailed both of them to take them up on it.

Michelle Hughes has also kindly offered to help publicise my books, but I really don't see why she feels she has to offer her help considering she's as much a victim of Jones as me. Michelle doesn't owe me anything at all. Michelle, don't worry about it. It's enough that we both do our bit to bring his activities out into the cold light of day so the world can see him for what he is and hopefully give him fewer opportunities to carry on with ANy of his criminality.

As I mentioned earlier in this thread, I've contacted Avon and Somerset Police about the plagiarism. And while they've thanked me for the information I supplied and even expressed some sympathy for his theft of my work, they said nothing about my information being helpful to them in presenting a fully-rounded picture of his character to the courts. I've supplied all my details to them if they wish to contact me further.

I've now heard back from Createspace and Draft2Digital as well as Amazon itself. Amazon is I imagine perusing the rights documents to sent to them and I'll doubtless hear back from them shortly.

Createspace has put this matter into the hands of their specialist department, whom they said will get back to me.

The stars, for me, have been Draft2Digital. Dan from D2D, not only responded very promptly, he also said he has issued instructions for all Jones's works (not just the ones he stole from me) to be removed from the shelves of every retailer with whom they deal. I was very impressed with their speedy action. Well done Dan of D2D!

I'll contact The Huffington post and provide them with a link to this thread. As you said, BB, they may well be interested in covering this story, so I'll give it a go.

If anyone has any other suggestions as to how we can all publicise Karl Jones's activities and try to ensure he is prevented in future from continuing them, I'll be happy to respond.

Now I'm off to get that blog post written.

And then . . . and then, promise . . . I shall get back to emailing my ebooks to my poor, still waiting giveaway winners!


----------



## Sally C (Mar 31, 2011)

I wonder would it be worth contacting any of those five star reviewers, and ask them if they would like to attach their glowing reviews to the actual original books too, rather than his?


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

I've contacted my local newspaper with the story and they are going to check it out. It's not a national paper, and they might not do anything about it, but if they do it could be picked up by the bigger nationals.


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## H. S. St. Ours (Mar 24, 2012)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> I find it ironic that "Karl Jones" is the name of a researcher with an expertise in combatting student plagiarism.
> 
> http://ecet.ecs.uni-ruse.bg/cst05/Docs/cp/sIV/IV.8.pdf
> 
> Betsy


Ironic? Or maybe a brash middle finger in our collective face?


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## Drake (Apr 30, 2014)

The world is full of thieves who'd rather spend their time stealing others work than actually working themselves.  No morals whatsoever.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

H. S. St. Ours said:


> Ironic? Or maybe a brash middle finger in our collective face?


Well, since it appears that the author we've been discussing's real name is Karl Jones (surely his arrest wouldn't be under his pen name) and since surely Jones is as common in the UK as it is here, my belief then and now is that they aren't the same person and that it's a coincidence they have the same name. Although I haven't checked.

Let me add that, despite my prior post having a somewhat light tone, I take the plagiarism very seriously indeed and kind of regret having made the post--sometimes I get caught up in what's interesting to me and forget how it might appear to someone else. (Note that when I posted that, the criminal actions had not yet been posted about here.) From early on, we've been satisfied enough that the plagiarism happened to have deleted the thread for the book in question and have banned Karl Jone's account.

Betsy


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## Michelle Hughes (Dec 12, 2011)

I did decided to do a blog post even though I know it's just stirring up old wounds.  Maybe someone will stop this man from doing this to another author, I seriously doubt it, but what can it hurt.


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## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

Monique said:


> Wow. I wonder if he plagiarized all of his other books from members here.


I looked through "his" books, and there are quite a few. I didn't see anything that resembled my work, but everyone here should go make sure. This is one of the big reasons why I no longer list my books in my signature. It's unfortunate that a few bad apples try to ruin it for the rest of us.



Mandy said:


> At least he's getting reamed in his reviews for the series. I wonder if he'll respond.


I was sitting here wondering the same thing. What a jerk. Stealing the hard work of others is beyond sickening, and I doubt we'll ever hear from him. It would certainly make things interesting if he responded, though.



Paul Huxley said:


> Okay, I'm pretty sure this is the guy.
> 
> http://letteschat.com/2014/07/17/karl-jones-the-pedophile-in-our-midst/
> 
> http://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/news/11350120.Convicted_paedophile_admits_sexually_abusing_four_year_old_Bradford_girl/


WHAT? Never mind my last post about wondering if he'll respond. If this is the same person, someone needs to lock him under the jail.


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## LettesChat (Jul 20, 2014)

A reminder if you're connected to him on Linked In to disconnect yourself. I got a notification that today is his birthday from Linked In   which prompted me to swiftly removed him. I also blocked and reported him to their management team with the substantiating links to this forum and the U.K. news article. Hopefully they will kick them out of their database.


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## Michelle Hughes (Dec 12, 2011)

Geraldine,

I talked to Draft2Digital today and they've advised me to send them a DMCA Take Down Notice on my work.  They asked if any other author has been infringed to please send the same notice to them at [email protected] so they can stop him from publishing on their site.

Truly,
Michelle


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## I&#039;m a Little Teapot (Apr 10, 2014)

I'm pretty appalled at how slowly Amazon is dealing with this one. When it was a bunch of Stephen King (and other authors) recently, they yanked the account almost immediately. The least they could do is pull this pedophile-plagiarist's BUY buttons until it's sorted out.


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## Rachel E. Rice (Jan 4, 2014)

TurnItIn is good. If you purchase it, try putting your book through its system first, however, you may find problems with your own work. It's not fool proof. I've used it before with term papers, where you aren't allowed to use any ideas from previous papers. The universities consider that plagiarizing. If you have a copyright date and published your work through the internet or sent your work through the internet, you shouldn't have a problem.


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## unkownwriter (Jun 22, 2011)

Geraldine, Amazon normally will remove books they determine to have infringed upon copyright. I know this personally because I reported a book, and they sent me an email and said the book was no longer published. So, they were notified over the weekend, but they will get on it.

I'm glad this person no longer has an account here, and the book isn't in the Bazaar. Hopefully he'll be too busy lying to his fellow prisoners about his crime to try stealing any more books for a while.

I've looked at his books, and nothing immediately stood out to me as being from another author. But I haven't read every book published.   I do think his SF book (something about a brother) looked familiar, but I check out so many books from folks here and elsewhere on the net that I could have seen it before and it be his actual work.


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## Michelle Hughes (Dec 12, 2011)

Amazon contacted me today and told me they were removing the Lessons book from Jones.  I was advised it could take two or three days.  I'd like to thank Ruby for bringing this post to my attention.  Fortunately Jones wasn't selling under that title since the ranking was in the 500,000 range, but the fact that he would attempt this yet again, still astonishes me.  Just to push that point home I'd like to ask if you wrote an entire book, then handed it over to another person to edit and offered them 25% of profits for doing it and adding their name to a book, would you not feel that was more than enough?  Was I really being selfish?  Personally I think I was just being stupid, and that was a lesson learned.

But for him to publish that book again with only a few name changes and a title change?  How is that any different than say taking Twilight and adding a few alterations and then putting it back out for sale?  I never understood how people stood beside him as he did this, never.  People I'd even considered friends.  My point is if you don't come up with the story how in the world can you claim it's your book?  Yes this has opened up an old can of worms, which I never wanted to relive again.  The fact that this man can publish my work when my own original was stolen and not allowed back on Amazon really ticks me off!


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

Nola Lightman said:


> Hiya, guys.
> 
> So sorry you've had to go through this, Geraldine, but it must be so much easier to endure with the overwhelming support of our fellow Kboarders lifting you up.
> 
> ...


Is he still a member here on Kboards? He could have been reading this thread and decided to shut down his twitter and blog.

What name did/does he use on Kboards? Wonder if he has any sock puppet accounts here.

I'm glad to hear that Amazon and the other companies are cracking down on this thief.

Michelle, I think you were being more than generous to offer 25% of your profits indefinitely to an editor. No, you weren't being selfish at all. You offered him a sweet deal and he turned around and stole your work. I doubt that there are many editors who would steal the works they edited, regardless of the payment arrangements. This man is just a crook. After all, he stole Hardnutt's books, and she never had any contact with him at all. We don't know how many books he's stolen from other authors. How did he pick his victims? He targeted you, Michelle, whom he knew and had worked with, but Hardnutt was a total stranger.

In hindsight, Michelle, I would have advised this, assuming you were working with an honest person instead of a crook: get an agreement with the editor on how much the editing services are worth, then have a contract to pay him/her 25% of the profits until the agreed-upon amount has been paid. For example, suppose that the cost of editing was $100; you'd give him a profit share up to $100. After that is paid, you don't owe him anything else.


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## LaurenPeyton (Jul 22, 2014)

Hey I just saw what you are going through. What a horrible thing. The person doing this is a scumbag. You are an amazing writer and I guess he took that whole "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery" thing a little too far. Just keep doing you and the law is on your side. I'm here to support you even if you don't know me. I hope to get to know you in time! XOXO- Lauren


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Nothing to add to the main points of this    thread, but about turnitin.com ... that sort of tool wouldn't work well in Amazon's system because it's not a fully automated process. Turnitin doesn't find plagiarism. There's no such thing as a turnitin report that says a piece of writing is "20% plagiarized," or whatever. Rather, turnitin finds _matching text_. If that matching text is correctly quoted and cited, it is not plagiarized. If it's coincidental duplicate phrasing, it's also not plagiarized. So a text could be 40% matched and have no plagiarism at all; it could be 2% matched and contain plagiarism. The only way to know is to actually get human eyeballs on the report. I use turninit religiously, and it's effective at helping me catch student plagiarism. Since I started using it, no semester has gone by without my catching at least one plagiarizer. (Pause to appreciate how depressing that is, eh?) But it only works because I dedicate time to examining each report. That's not something Amazon wants to pay people to do.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Bluebonnet said:


> Is he still a member here on Kboards? He could have been reading this thread and decided to shut down his twitter and blog.
> 
> What name did/does he use on Kboards? Wonder if he has any sock puppet accounts here.


If you've read the thread, you'll know that we have banned him and remove his book threads. And, yes, we thought of sock puppet accounts, and, no, he doesn't have any that we could determine. But KB can be read without being a member here. Although there are a lot of blogs and tweets about him right now; a Google alert would be sufficient.

Betsy


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> If you've read the thread, you'll know that we have banned him and remove his book threads. And, yes, we thought of sock puppet accounts, and, no, he doesn't have any that we could determine. But KB can be read without being a member here. Although there are a lot of blogs and tweets about him right now; a Google alert would be sufficient.
> 
> Betsy


Thanks, Betsy. I didn't go back and re-read the older posts on the thread before I made my last post. *red-faced*

True, since this is a public forum, he could be reading the thread that way. Maybe it will discourage him from further plagiarism, but he seems to be a particularly hard case.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

No problem--I just know that others, too, wouldn't read the whole thread and wanted to make it clear that we've done what we can here.  

Betsy


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## dataangel (Jul 23, 2014)

Reddit picked up the story after I posted about it: http://www.reddit.com/r/books/comments/2b6xwe/amazon_author_plagiarizes_entire_series_published/

So the word is definitely out there and spreading.

Also, the "O'Malley" books seem to be missing from his Amazon page. The second one disappeared first. The first one disappeared sometime today. It's probably a slow process because they have to delete the book not only from their supply, but also from the kindles of the people that bought it.


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## meowbiscuit (Jul 17, 2014)

Just an FYI - He's still on Google +: https://plus.google.com/100065154671713134704/posts


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

LettesChat said:


> Geraldine, if you would like to come on my show and tell your story, please contact me at [email protected] - not to sensationalize this monster, but to let others know your story so they can start checking to make sure he hasn't stolen their work too. I can confirm Michelle's story as being true because she was a member of that small group I mentioned in my previous post.
> 
> By coming on the show, you will reach a wider audience. It's the one small thing I can offer, personally, to expose him.


My internet connection has been down for the last four days and is still down. I'm borrowing a friend's computer to post this.

For some reason, her computer won't let me access my email, so I hope you get this message.

If I haven't got myself in a muddle with all this aggravation, I'm supposed to be appearing on your show on 31 July 2014. I had agreed to do a live show, but as my friend has to get up very early in the morning, I can't expect her to stay up late to lock up after me so I can do the show live. Is it possible we could do a recording earlier in the day?

I'm sorry about this. I've been tearing my hair out as you can imagine. I can't get the engineer out until 6 August!

Geraldine


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Help!

I'm supposed to be doing a guest blog post, but all my notes are in my email account which I am unable to access (my internet access is still down and I'm using a friend's computer, which for some reason won't let me access my in-box even though it lets me get into the actual account. Aargh!)

So, please, if you were the kind person who made the guest post offer about my plagiarism experience, could you please post here (at least I can get into kboards!) and let me know how many words you would like and when by?

I can use my friend's email account to send the post.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Hi All,

*LATEST UPDATE*

As you'll note from the above posts, my internet access has been down for the past four days, so I haven't been able to update you on what's been happening about this Karl Jones (I don't know what else has happened since I was last able to access the web and I still haven't figured out why I can't access my emails on my friend's computer).

Anyway, all the retailers I contacted (Amazon, Createspace, Smashwords, D2D), have agreed to remove this plagiarist's books from their shelves. Goodreads may well have also replied, but I have no idea if they've emailed me.

As you'll also see from the above, I have been invited to do a podcast and a guest blog post, which I am very happy to do. Thank you both for the offers.

My brain's just about died trying to get all geeky and figure out how to fix my internet access. Unfortunately not geeky enough!

I may well have forgotten anything else I wanted to update you about. Senior Moments...


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I've contacted my local newspaper with the story and they are going to check it out. It's not a national paper, and they might not do anything about it, but if they do it could be picked up by the bigger nationals.


Wow! Thanks, Jan. That's amazing. I'll have to trade on my friend's good nature to get on her computer as she has her own business to run and might yank me off of here at any time. But I'll ask her very nicely if I can come back and be a nuisance in her office tomorrow as well so I can see what else is happening.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Sally Clements said:


> I wonder would it be worth contacting any of those five star reviewers, and ask them if they would like to attach their glowing reviews to the actual original books too, rather than his?


Lol! Intimate friends all, I don't doubt. Not likely to love me QUITE as much.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Geraldine - if your friend has more than one browser on her computer (e.g. IE versus Chrome, or Safari versus Chrome, etc.), open the one she doesn't use and try to access your email on that.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Just remembered what else I need to update you about.

I also contacted The Huffington Post UK, as suggested by Bluebonnet, and gave them all the details.

If Ican figure out this email access problem to see who's contacted me I'll come back here and update you again.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Christa Wick said:


> Geraldine - if your friend has more than one browser on her computer (e.g. IE versus Chrome, or Safari versus Chrome, etc.), open the one she doesn't use and try to access your email on that.


Ah. Thanks, Christa. I'll give it a go.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

hardnutt said:


> Anyway, all the retailers I contacted (Amazon, Createspace, Smashwords, D2D), have agreed to remove this plagiarist's books from their shelves. Goodreads may well have also replied, but I have no idea if they've emailed me.


The books in the O'Malley Series seem to be gone on Amazon, though he still has other books available there.

Betsy


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Christa Wick said:


> Geraldine - if your friend has more than one browser on her computer (e.g. IE versus Chrome, or Safari versus Chrome, etc.), open the one she doesn't use and try to access your email on that.


It worked! Thanks for the tip, Christa. I'll remember that when I come 'on the borrow' tomorrow!


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

UPDATE

I've now been able to check my emails on my friend's computer, thanks to Christa!

There's no reply from either ThePassiveVoice or huffpost, so I guess they're not interested.

Oh well. It was worth a try.

Betsy, thank you. Yes. I took a second to check on amazon and, as you say, they're both gone. Alas, they've also in error removed one of mine!

No time now to get on to amazon. It'll have to wait till tomorrow, depending on whether I can elbow my friend out of the way and get on her computer!


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

hardnutt said:


> UPDATE
> 
> I've now been able to check my emails on my friend's computer, thanks to Christa!
> 
> ...


My commiserations re your computer. My motherboard recently packed in, but thank goodness my nextdoor but one neighbour is my tech guy and it was replaced quite promptly. We also use Team-viewer, which means he can log onto my computer from his and sort out any problems. Can your computer be fixed remotely?


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

hardnutt said:


> UPDATE
> 
> I've now been able to check my emails on my friend's computer, thanks to Christa!
> 
> ...


They took one of _your_ books down? Hmmm. Wonder if Jones contacted Amazon and claimed that specific book was really his book.

Glad you found a workaround for your computer problems! I would be tearing my hair out if that happened to me.


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## Mandy (Dec 27, 2009)

I just searched 'Karl Jones' on Amazon, and, not only are all his books gone, but Geraldine's book that he plagiarized is now the first item in the search results.


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## RhondaW (Mar 31, 2012)

Hmmm, I wonder if it depends on where you are searching from as I just searched and his author page is still there, albeit with only 11 books left, so 32 have been removed. (I am in Canada) http://www.amazon.com/Karl-Jones/e/B006ZJKS1G


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

On Amazon UK there is one paperback by Karl Jones and one short story in the Kindle search. There are also books by Carl Jones.

I also see his author page on Amazon.com which is displaying some of his books.


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## RhondaW (Mar 31, 2012)

I missed this originally when I looked at his page but only paperbacks are available now and of the 11, three of them are 'Out of Print - Limited Availability'. All ebooks have been removed. Hooray!


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Got my internet access back!


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Michelle Hughes said:


> Geraldine,
> 
> I talked to Draft2Digital today and they've advised me to send them a DMCA Take Down Notice on my work. They asked if any other author has been infringed to please send the same notice to them at [email protected] so they can stop him from publishing on their site.
> 
> ...


Thanks, Michelle. Yes, D2D wrote to me, too. I sent them the take down notice last week in the tiny window I had to get online. Fingers crossed, now the engineer has fixed it, my internet connection will stay 'connected'.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

hardnutt said:


> Got my internet access back!


That must be a relief


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> Well, since it appears that the author we've been discussing's real name is Karl Jones (surely his arrest wouldn't be under his pen name) and since surely Jones is as common in the UK as it is here, my belief then and now is that they aren't the same person and that it's a coincidence they have the same name. Although I haven't checked.
> 
> Let me add that, despite my prior post having a somewhat light tone, I take the plagiarism very seriously indeed and kind of regret having made the post--sometimes I get caught up in what's interesting to me and forget how it might appear to someone else. (Note that when I posted that, the criminal actions had not yet been posted about here.) From early on, we've been satisfied enough that the plagiarism happened to have deleted the thread for the book in question and have banned Karl Jone's account.
> 
> Betsy


Great! Good riddance. Thanks, Betsy. Apologies for not replying before, but my internet access went walkabout. Just got it back today. Been forced to borrow occasional access from a friend and then had to go at it like something demented before she wanted her computer back.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Mandy said:


> I just searched 'Karl Jones' on Amazon, and, not only are all his books gone, but Geraldine's book that he plagiarized is now the first item in the search results.


Now that's what I call a 'result'! Thanks, Mandy.


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## unkownwriter (Jun 22, 2011)

I still see his page here in the US on the .com site, with eleven books now (three of them with Michelle's name also listed).

Glad you got your Internet fixed, Geraldine. It drives me crazy when ours goes out, so I know you must have been terribly frustrated trying to handle this situation.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> My commiserations re your computer. My motherboard recently packed in, but thank goodness my nextdoor but one neighbour is my tech guy and it was replaced quite promptly. We also use Team-viewer, which means he can log onto my computer from his and sort out any problems. Can your computer be fixed remotely?


Yes, it can. I have team viewer (but never knew what it was for! Thanks for the info .


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> That must be a relief


You bet! When you're running a business, as we all are, it's vital to be able to get online. I don't know how business people survived without it before. It just adds so many more options.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Bluebonnet said:


> They took one of _your_ books down? Hmmm. Wonder if Jones contacted Amazon and claimed that specific book was really his book.
> 
> Glad you found a workaround for your computer problems! I would be tearing my hair out if that happened to me.


Don't know, BB. But I don't understand why they would as I supplied them with the letters from my ex-publishers in which they returned the rights in both these books to me.

Haven't had the time yet to get on to them about it as I've been working my way down the first librarything giveaway that I did and getting the books sent out. Been putting it off and putting it off as it's such a tedious thing to do. Thankfully, I've now finished the sending out for that giveaway. Later I have to start sending out for the second giveaway I did. Boy, do I regret offering 100 ebooks in each of these giveaways! And all of them have to be sent all three formats as librarything has no way to tell which format their members prefer. Next time it'll definitely be no more than ten. Even more time-consuming when your computer's being contrary.

Life. A trying beast.


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## valeriec80 (Feb 24, 2011)

hardnutt said:


> Haven't had the time yet to get on to them about it as I've been working my way down the first librarything giveaway that I did and getting the books sent out. Been putting it off and putting it off as it's such a tedious thing to do. Thankfully, I've now finished the sending out for that giveaway. Later I have to start sending out for the second giveaway I did. Boy, do I regret offering 100 ebooks in each of these giveaways! And all of them have to be sent all three formats as librarything has no way to tell which format their members prefer. Next time it'll definitely be no more than ten. Even more time-consuming when your computer's being contrary.


I don't know how you're doing this, but do you know about blind carbon copies (bcc)? Basically, you can put a whole bunch of emails in that field and send out one message. All the emails get it, but none of them can see the other people's email addresses. The only thing you have to watch is limits of how many mass emails you can send via google/yahoo/hotmail, so I wouldn't do more than fifty people on message in those kinds of programs. When I do it, however, I just use the email address attached to my domain name, so I can send as many "mass" emails as I want. Anyway, pardon if that was old hat for you. It can still be tedious to copy-paste every single email address.  Maybe it will be useful info for someone else if it's not for you.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

valeriec80 said:


> I don't know how you're doing this, but do you know about blind carbon copies (bcc)? Basically, you can put a whole bunch of emails in that field and send out one message. All the emails get it, but none of them can see the other people's email addresses. The only thing you have to watch is limits of how many mass emails you can send via google/yahoo/hotmail, so I wouldn't do more than fifty people on message in those kinds of programs. When I do it, however, I just use the email address attached to my domain name, so I can send as many "mass" emails as I want. Anyway, pardon if that was old hat for you. It can still be tedious to copy-paste every single email address.  Maybe it will be useful info for someone else if it's not for you.


Wow! Another thing I knew nothing about, Valerie! If you think of me as technologically illiterate you'll have it about right. :-(.

I've no idea how to do this bcc thing. Can you please explain?


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## Pete Morin (Oct 16, 2011)

hardnutt said:


> Wow! Another thing I knew nothing about, Valerie! If you think of me as technologically illiterate you'll have it about right. :-(.
> 
> I've no idea how to do this bcc thing. Can you please explain?


Howdy,

When you open window for a new email, you have a "To:" box, and a "cc:" box. Around where you see the "cc:", you should have another link that says "show BCC" (depending on what ISP you use, it will look different).

Click on "BCC" and a separate window will open for you to place the recipients' email addresses. They'll all get it, but won't see each other.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

smallfish said:


> Howdy,
> 
> When you open window for a new email, you have a "To:" box, and a "cc:" box. Around where you see the "cc:", you should have another link that says "show BCC" (depending on what ISP you use, it will look different).
> 
> Click on "BCC" and a separate window will open for you to place the recipients' email addresses. They'll all get it, but won't see each other.


I add this to the end of all my emails (not that people take much notice  )


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Pete and Jan,

Thank you so much. If I ever get a fully-functioning computer, I'll use that bcc thing to send these giveaways out (still not done. :-()

Sorry I didn't reply earlier, but continuing computer problems have forced me to hand control of my laptop over to a techie guy for the past two days (and continuing. I'll have to hand control back to him in a minute) for a complete overhaul.

Wish I knew how so many of you on here are so clued up on the techie stuff. Did you go to computer classes? I've attended one or two, but they never taught the things I needed to know (I don't think the teachers knew a lot more than me, to be frank! I'm sure they did a quick swot up the night before so they were one step ahead of the class for the next lesson).

Since going indie I've learned how to format, blog, use Gimp to make basic covers for my non-fiction and loads of other stuff (most of it learned from you and other generous souls on these boards). But there's always something else to learn. I'm expecting brain overload any day! KA-BOOOOOM!

My new mantra is: download NOTHING. Download NOTHING. Download NOTHING!

Thanks again.


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## LettesChat (Jul 20, 2014)

The final piece to this puzzle has finally been laid. For all those who may have doubted...

http://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/news/11429231.Horror_novel_writer_jailed_for_molesting_Bradford_girl__four/


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Has there been any update on this character? Have all his books been removed?


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Well, that was quick - we were within seconds of posting


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## Nicholas Andrews (Sep 8, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Has there been any update on this character? Have all his books been removed?


Not everything, but it is amusing that when searching for "Karl Jones" in the Kindle store, Geraldine's Dead Before Morning is the top result, even before his author page.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Nicholas Andrews said:


> Not everything, but it is amusing that when searching for "Karl Jones" in the Kindle store, Geraldine's Dead Before Morning is the top result, even before his author page.


Hmm. Not keen on having my name associated with this creature in people's minds.

I was just about to post the link to the newspaper report which a kind friend on fb sent me.

If he behaves himself in jail, he'll likely be out in eighteen months. Not a pleasant thought.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

hardnutt said:


> Hmm. Not keen on having my name associated with this creature in people's minds.
> 
> I was just about to post the link to the newspaper report which a kind friend on fb sent me.
> 
> If he behaves himself in jail, he'll likely be out in eighteen months. Not a pleasant thought.


Perhaps someone can put him back inside for plagiarism


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Worth a shot, Jan!


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## Michelle Hughes (Dec 12, 2011)

I'd love to be the person who kept him in jail for plagiarism, but was told that by allowing his name on the cover I'd lessened my chances of ever getting a resolution. Have you thought about doing what this other author did to raise funds for her case? She used a site called Go Fund Me? http://johndopp.com/plagiarism-sam-taylor-mullens-busted/ I was naive and uninformed but you have a fighting chance to finally take this thief down.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Worth a shot, Michelle. Just not by this author. It's not that I'm a coward. Well not too much of a one. It's just that bankruptcy, while it has its uses, also has many drawbacks. Although, I'm sure, for Karl Jones, bankruptcy would hold no fears.

Can't pay. Won't pay. Sure to be his watch words of choice. And then it would be me chased through the courts by my legal representatives because, surprise, I proved unable to pay their enormous bill. Yes, Go-Fund is an admirable idea. But somehow, I have my doubts that it will meet the author's legal costs. It's way too uncertain a route for the average impoverished author to take.

Jones has already caused me more than enough aggravation and many hours of my time. I just want to draw a veil over the entire episode and get on with some work.


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## Decon (Feb 16, 2011)

Without reading all the pOsts. Have the books been deleted by Amazon


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Yes, Decon, they have. But only after I proved (yet again!) to Amazon that I owned the rights.


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## CfaE (Jul 25, 2014)

Wow, I just read this entire thread, and what happened to you is awful. I'm so glad you got your books back. 

I've seen some pretty bad things in the online writing world, most of which I wish I could unsee. I've seen guys like this one outed and sued, and they STILL come back and try again. Like most things, there are only a small selection of bad guys out there and a whole lot of great people, but the bad ones run riot on Amazon, basically ruining the experience for everyone else. 

I heard of an 'indie bestseller' who goes to lesbian chat rooms to cyber-rape the women there as his marketing strategy. Apparently, it's working for him too. They all think he's a lesbian. When they find out he's not, they end up in therapy. 

The internet is just rife with horrific deeds, which make me question the state of humanity. I'm all for net neutrality. But in cases like this, you have to question if anonymity should be mixed with money-making like it is on Amazon. How does a pedo manage to publish on Amazon in the first place? I'd really like some real identity checks on Amazon for authors by their administration. You can still have a pen name publicly, but it would weed out the criminals if they looked a little bit closer at some of their authors.

Although, I don't see this guy coming back any time soon. As a child molester in a UK prison, he'll be lucky if he gets out of the prison hospital, which he inevitably ends up in, in one piece.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Thanks, Claire. 

I agree. By now, Amazon must know just about everything there is to know about _me_, including my underwear and shoe sizes, so I don't think it could be too difficult for them to be more stringent in their agreements to publish.

As for Karl Jones, I just hope someone in prison administers a good kicking in his offending organ, so that it gives him pause for thought in that particular 'P' crime, even if there's still nothing in place to prevent him signing up under another name and plagiarising another author at will.


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## CfaE (Jul 25, 2014)

hardnutt said:


> Thanks, Claire.
> 
> I agree. By now, Amazon must know just about everything there is to know about _me_, including my underwear and shoe sizes, so I don't think it could be too difficult for them to be more stringent in their agreements to publish.
> 
> As for Karl Jones, I just hope someone in prison administers a good kicking in his offending organ, so that it gives him pause for thought in that particular 'P' crime, even if there's still nothing in place to prevent him signing up under another name and plagiarising another author at will.


It'd be nice to see Amazon delete his account. I know he can make another one, but how many bank accounts and addresses can he have? Surely their billing dept can match up data to decide who is who? If they receive a report about a plagairist and it's proven that he stole a book, why not delete his account and ban that bank account, name and corresponding address from using Amazon? Even if he gets a new bank account, the name and address remains the same. I wish Amazon would make it more difficult for these people to have KDP accounts. All Ammy need to do is follow the money. In the UK, you can't have a fake bank account. KDP needs a bank account or an address to pay people. If they get the same one, then they've got a match for their ban.

Sure, the guy could have his cheques sent to his aunt Doris. But even then, how is he going to cash them? The cheque will be made out to his name. It will be cashed at his bank account. There's a paper trail to anyone who earns money from Amazon. If these people plagairise books, their accounts should be deleted, and they should be banned based on bank account, name and address.

I don't understand why Amazon don't enforce this kind of ban on people who are proven plagairists. Okay, they can't stop them before they commit a crime. But once the guy is caught in the act, why isn't his account banned for life so he can't do it again?

I guess this is my pet grumble of the day. Amazon have a legal department who look at these complaints. Why don't they go one step further and ban the offending users when they catch them? I can't see what stops them. If you pay someone money, you know their bank details and where they live. That's enough information to stop them coming back as a sock puppet.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Agreed, Claire. Surely they realise how damaging to their reputation it is for them to let someone like this continue to have an account.

When I changed my bank account earlier this year, I had to provide all sorts of proof of ID (passport, driving license, utility bill), so it's not as if it's easy to organise one under a false name. According to all the thrillers I've read, fake ID costs a pretty penny.

I also hope Amazon make a claim to get back the money he 'earned' on these books as I see no reason why he should be allowed to keep money gained by fraud.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Oops! Realised that, as well as updating my original post, to move it up, I also had to 'reply', so plagiarised romance author Jerri Hines's experience would also get an airing!


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## unkownwriter (Jun 22, 2011)

Somebody started a thread about this guy earlier. I reported it to Amazon through a link on the bottom page of one of the books. No idea how long it will take until something is done. He's so out about what he's done, they shouldn't have a problem dropping the hammer on him.


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## hardnutt (Nov 19, 2010)

Thanks, She. I wasn't sure how I was meant to update my thread, but I wanted to link to mine so we can perhaps get some kind of plagiariser history down on kb. I didn't see your post about Jerri Hines's plagiariser before I posted or I'd probably have added to your thread.

Perhaps Betty will take my edited post and merge?

Anyway, the link to the thief's edition of Jerri Hine's book is now broken, so I presume Amazon has removed the fake.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

hardnutt, thank you for trying to combine posts, but it's fine to post a new thread about this situation, if you like. Doing so might make it easier for members to find the relevant information, since this thread is already so lengthy.

On another matter, I've deleted a post seeking to identify the plagiarizer's real or other name based on photos. KB isn't the place to organize an investigation to uncover this person's identity.


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

I'm going to close this thread to avoid further confusion since even the relevant most recent post is from 2014.


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