A few weeks back some enterprising young fellow called Benjamin Halbe sold a car previously owned by Pope Benedict XVI on Germany’s eBay site. He got £130,000 for it too. With an original purchase price of just £6,000, that happily dispels the myth that second-hand cars lose half their value when you hand over your cash.

You’d be happy with neigh on £124,000 profit for a car that’s no more a popemobile than Delboy’s Robin Reliant, wouldn’t you? Us too, just think of all the copies of Akton’s Lonely (CDs) we could buy for a start.

Still, Benjamin Halbe is not happy. He thinks the £130,000 is no where near enough. Never mind that it’s more than ample mullah to purchase the new Aston Martin DB9 (Cars) and a half-attractive prostitute to drive past your old school in.

eBay are solely to blame for this lacklustre sale according to Halbe. Before you jump up and down complaining that nobody paid more than a tenner for all those Star Wars (Darth Tater) figures you were saving to pay for a holiday in the Dordogne, Halbe has actually backed up his sour grapes with the scariest thing in the entire world; a German legal firm.

Lawyer Juergen Langer, Halbe’s representative from the positively Vader shatting Ulsenheimer and Friedrich maintains:

“Proven bidders who wanted to offer more but whose bids for higher amounts for unknown reasons were not registered on the eBay site".

To counter this claim that potential buyers could not log onto make a bid, eBay have so far only admitted "the car had been the most popular item ever to have been sold on its pages".

Internet casino group Golden Palace were eventually successful in securing the sale. Their 188,938.88 Euro bid easily scuppered some poor old dear in Somerset who thought it might be a nice birthday present for her nephew.

We obviously can’t comment on the legalities of the case itself, but we can skirt neatly around them in the hope of only ever having to guess what Juergen Langer’s signature might look like. The validity of Halbe’s so called ‘popemobile’ is not the legal question here, and to be honest that’s our biggest grievance.

A Volkswagen Golf with no Armourlite glass and not enough room to comfortably play a round of poker is not a popemobile. It’s a small car once owned by a pleasant churchy guy who later became pope. Wearing a knee pad on your head would probably give you greater protection from all those bonkers fundamentalists.

What is a Golf anyway? An Audi TT for middle management that’s what. Certainly not a car worth more than our editor’s salary at any rate.

Poor dead Pope John Paul II hated the idea of the popemobile. He once pleaded “It’s just so undignified a title…at least stop reminding me of how ridiculous the thing looks. Give me some peace.” Seems Benjamin Albe might have more problems ahead of him at the Pearly Gates.

Never piss off a man who’s closer to God than George Best. We did once and look what we came back as.

[story by Chris Laverty]