Government investigators are "delving into the financial collapse" of the Caterham Formula One team founded by Tony Fernandes, the League Championship side Queens Park Rangers chair, according to Kevin Eason of the LONDON TIMES. Administrators handling the "winding up of the British-based team have remained in control," even though assets -- such as factory equipment and team overalls -- were sold off a year ago, and now the government’s Insolvency Service "is involved." A senior investigator from the Insolvency Service, which has the "power to hand over files to the police and courts," has interviewed Constantin Cojocar, the cleaner-turned-managing director, who was "apparently in charge of the business in its final days before administrators closed the doors." Cojocar is "flying into London from Romania today for an interview with Finbarr O’Connell," the administrator with Smith & Williamson. But the former footballer said that "he is a broken man after the curious goings-on" of Oct. '14. Cojocar seems to have been an "unwitting dupe" in Caterham’s unraveling. In a "damning report" to the High Court at the end of '14, O’Connell said that accounts were "in total disarray," with records out of date and inaccurate. Cojocar said that "he was given the job as factory cleaner, but was sent to an office in London where he was told to sign official papers, which made him managing director and in sole charge of the factory in Leafield, Oxfordshire." The richest motor racing series in the world had a "team led by a cleaner who was sleeping on a camp bed in his office" (LONDON TIMES, 2/8).
