Waste Disposal - Interview under caution

googler

You need to ask to see all of the evidence links the waste to you and your address.

If the council produce one or more letters addressed to you that they've recovered from the area, you need to look them over and establish whether or not you've actually seen them.

If they've been mis-delivered to a neighbour, and the neighbour has fly-tipped them, then you can look the council official in the eye and say honestly to him/her - "I've never seen that letter in my life. It hasn't been received at my house, nor through my hands, so I couldn't have disposed of it at the location you found it"

geoffky

do not go unless legally represented...as what you say will be used AGAINST you..

vax2002

A solicitor will usually offer the advice that you avail yourself of your right to silence and attend nothing until you are arrested, as then you can have FREE legal representation.

newDude

vax2002 wrote: »

you can have FREE legal representation.

Provided newten passes the means test.

Road_Hog

vax2002 wrote: »

A solicitor will usually offer the advice that you avail yourself of your right to silence and attend nothing until you are arrested, as then you can have FREE legal representation.

Personally I would go with this. I'd decline their invitation, you have nothing to gain from it. The only thing you can do at this interview is possibly incriminate yourself.

Also the 'formal caution' means nothing, I do love the way that councils like to use this wording. I can issue a formal caution to anyone, but it has no legal standing unless I were a policeman.

Yorkie1

Road_Hog wrote: »

Personally I would go with this. I'd decline their invitation, you have nothing to gain from it. The only thing you can do at this interview is possibly incriminate yourself.

Also the 'formal caution' means nothing, I do love the way that councils like to use this wording. I can issue a formal caution to anyone, but it has no legal standing unless I were a policeman.

You are wrong, Road-Hog.

The council have investigative powers granted to them under statute. That includes the power to interview where there is some evidence of the interviewee having committed a criminal offence.

The interview is conducted under caution and in accordance with PACE 1984.

If a prosecution follows, then inferences may be drawn from any silence at interview, as outlined in the caution.

http://www.southribble.gov.uk/Section.asp?sectiontype=listseparate&catid=301187 is a useful summary. Although it refers mainly to benefit investigations, the principles and law remain the same.

This is a serious investigation, for which the ultimate penalty (albeit admittedly unlikely in a case such as OP's) is imprisonment. Please don't provide advice which you do not know to be correct.

Furthermore (in relation to other posts), there is no necessity for an arrest before a prosecution takes place. A summons will be issued by the council if it decides there is sufficient evidence to prosecute and that it is in the public interest to do so.

Failure to attend the interview will not prevent a prosecution, and if OP has a defence that s/he decided not to put forward at interview, the court at any trial will be able to draw inferences from that failure. For example, that you've made the story up subsequently. As previously stated, the interview provides the OP with the opportunity to create reasonable doubt that s/he has committed the offence. In the absence of that information, the council may well decide that it has enough to prosecute.

poppysarah

Never put your name and address in the rubbish! Shred and get rid of it.
Not cos of this - just generally.

Do you have proof of your comments about the landlord wanting you out?

WhiteHorse

Yorkie1 wrote: »

If a prosecution follows, then inferences may be drawn from any silence at interview, as outlined in the caution.

True, but it should also be pointed out that a conviction cannot be obtained simply by silence + no evidence. There must be something else.

jamie11

Yorkie1 wrote: »

The council have investigative powers granted to them under statute. That includes the power to interview where there is some evidence of the interviewee having committed a criminal offence.

.

That may be true, I don't know, but I would be surprised if the council had any formal powers of arrest. I believe that would be a prerequisite to an interview under caution.

Norman_Castle

Assuming your rubbish is a standard amount of domestic waste and you are a council tax payer, what reason would you have to flytip?. The shop, as a buisiness, has to pay for waste disposal, so they, or whoever took their waste has a reason to dump the waste illegally. Its likely your rubbish was taken with the landlords waste.