I was alittle startled by this comment and I said, "go over the bill? What was there to go over?" My final payment of $7,5000 was due on completion of the Black Beauty that was all I knew. Dean said as you know there was alot of extra work he did and was not part of the orignal agreement. At this point, I did not ask anymore questions. I knew where he was going. He then said I really dont want to talk with over the phone about it, just come by the shop and he would go over it with me. I said ok I would call him on a date I could come out. I called my wife and told her what he had said and my concerns. She was unamused. I instructed her to call Dean the next day and say I had to go out of town and would he fax a copy of the balance of the bill and go over with her. She called Dean and he moaned and did finally agreed, but he added he really wanted to go over it with me, before I saw it. I knew I was in trouble now. My heart skipped a beat, and I felt sick. The fax came over when I was not in the office and my wife called me and said, "are you sitting down?" I said, "that bad huh ?" She said, (now keep in mind, by balance was $7,500 up to this point no other conversation had taken place regarding addtionally charges.), the balance $17,600 dollars. As you are reading this, I want you to imagine for a moment what went through my head. I had just spent, about $45,000 up to this point on the Beauty including what I had paid to Dean and scrapped every dime I had to do this. I had been saving the final $7,500 for weeks, and now this man was handing me a bill for $12,600 more then I had or that I had ageed too!

I waited a day to cool down and I calmly called Dean the next day and tell him my shock over the bill. He said a number of things, like , "Thats why I only deal with studios and not the public" and " "I wanted to explain what I had done before you saw the bill" I said 2 things. What was the purpose of writing up the contract, if we did not abide by it ? and I said, "At what point did you think it would be fair to come to me, and tell me you were going to go over the estimate and the contract and let me decide if I could afford it? All the while I was biting my tongue and I had to stay calm, because he is a very explosive man. He mumbled a few things and said we needed to talk in person. So I ended the conversation and said I would round up the money in a couple of days and call him when I was coming to get the Black Beauty.

As you can see in the picture above of the originl contract it was very detailed. When I put the picture of contract 2 (I have not got to my papers yet) you will see it is also very detailed. The interesting things about the 2 contacts is both have much fo the same language in the 1st contract and also used in 2nd. Some words were changed. I have read it a million times by now, and I knew I was getting screwed. Remember Dean had said he was making more money on the knigh rider car and I guess in his mind he was going to make it right. The language in contract 1 and 2 was almost identical. There was maybe 2 things that were differant. It would say in # 1, create rear control panel and in contract 2 it said, "design and create" I had never asked for the windows to be tinted, he did that on his own, as everything he did. Now lets think about that for a second. There were a few things not done exactly they way the car was orignally done. The front phone was wrong, the lights were wrong, the rockets were not done right and the windows were titnted. But this was Dean Jeffries, the orignal builder maybe he had some second thoughts, maybe some parts were not available now. I really felt it was his to choose. I also really think the Beauty looked better with tinted windows, something not available in the 60's. But to charge me thousands of dollars more then agreed, that wasn't right. How about all the running around and getting parts and stuff I did? Did he factor in a discount? No Ok so what I am to do? First I went to the North Hollywood LAPD, yes the same guys that got shot up some years later in the Bank of America shooting in North Hollywood. I talked with a detective and told him my plight. While he agreed it was not right, he said it was a civil matter. I said, fine, I want to pickup my car, I have the title and he can sue me, if he feels I owe him. He said it does not work that way. He said he has the car, you have the title, sue him and you will have your day in court and sent me on my way. Ok, next a visit to my attorney, and as we know attorney do not talk to you for free, so I am racking a new bill going over all the facts and documents. He said we can do a few things but he has the car, it could easily disappear or something could happen to her between now and the time we get to court.He suggested I pay him and then we will sue. He felt it was a winnable case.

Ok I show up at Deans shop. 17,600 in my pocket and we starting going over the bill. Over the course of an hour Dean discounted the final bill to around $12,000, sill $7,000 more then the contract. Dean had realy believed what he was doing was right. He could not explain the language being simliar but whatever he was saying made sense to only him, and he was getting madder by the moment as we talked. I want to add my Beauty was alway accessible in his shop and this day it was blocked in the back of the shop with 3 vehicles in front of it. It barrigaded in. Does this sound like someone was worried I would take the car without paying his bill? You bet. I took the $12,000 out of my pocket and paid him. He was like a kid in a candy store as I counted outh the money. I had brought my truck and my car trailer and we proceeded to load her up. Get this Dean also had his garage door shut and locked, which he never did when he was open. He was prepared in case I just tried and take the car. What a guy. So I loaded her up and away I went. My last picture of Dean was him standing there with my cash almost falling out of his pockets waving good by.

Do I sound bitter? you bet. Dean called about 1 week later and told me someone was interested in showing the car at a show. We had talked earlier about teaming up on shows, model kits. At this point there was no way I was going to get involved with him. I also felt Dean probably had no rights to the Black Beauty anyway but As the agreement below shows, surprisily. Dean Jeffries holds all the rights to the Black Beauty.

I was floored when I read this. Green Hornet Inc believes they have the rights when in fact they dont. Even to this day. Dean has no idea how valuable this document is and how much money the Green Hornet has made with the polor light kits, the Johnny Lightning cars etc, that really belong to Dean Jeffries. I would tell him, though I think he knows and for whatever reason does not want to pursue it. Now if it was Goerge Barris , we know he would be right on your ass. He even had someones Batmobile confiscated because of his rights. This was an interesting aspect. I told him I would look into the show and never did. I was going to do it on my own. I wanted to trademark the Beauty, this was before I saw this document above, and if I had to deal with Jeffries, so be it. I also filed a lawsuit against Dean to get my money back.On the brighter side, I had the Beauty and she was looking good. I had contacted Van Williams and he agreed to come and visit me to take a look at it. Which he did. Van is really a nice guy.

Van visiting the Beauty for the first time in years.

One of my many advertisments realted to Jrs Black Beauty

final chapter is finished