Police screw up. legal help please?

cakehead

ajaxgeezer wrote: »

......the police don't have the power to make thieves pay, they can only get them into court.

Ironically, part of catching the thieves is collecting evidence through checks like fingerprinting... that same fingerprinting which the OP is hoping will move the cost of keeping his car safe from him/his insurance to the public purses.

The point I am trying to make here is that the CRIMINAL should PAY through THEIR own pocket for property taken that does not belong to THEM and not the victim of crimes. This action may then deter criminals from stealing if they realize that if caught, all damage/theft will be replaced in full by them and not by the victim's insurance.

ajaxgeezer

cakehead wrote: »

The point I am trying to make here is that the CRIMINAL should PAY through THEIR own pocket for property taken that does not belong to THEM and not the victim of crimes. This action may then deter criminals from stealing if they realize that if caught, all damage/theft will be replaced in full by them and not by the victim's insurance.

.....agreed but you know how pathetic the courts are in these circumstances. It would be 10p a week repayment, as the thief needs all of his dole money for his crack habit, and it would be against his human rights to deprive him of it. :rolleyes:

ajaxgeezer

s1h wrote: »

even if the insurance did pay this, there wouldnt be any point in claiming.

Your excess is probably at least £100 i would imagine.

I think the £100+ excess been established. The OP appears to want all the benefits of a low insurance quote without the consequences that brings with it.

cakehead

ajaxgeezer wrote: »

.....agreed but you know how pathetic the courts are in these circumstances. It would be 10p a week repayment, as the thief needs all of his dole money for his crack habit, and it would be against his human rights to deprive him of it. :rolleyes:

Yes ok then so do victims have human rights ? If I own a DVD player and it is kept in my home, my human rights say that no-one should come into my home uninvited and take my property without my consent and then sell it for a tenner in a pub. I know what belongs to me and what doesn't, so does the thief. I should be able to recover my property or monies from the thief regardless of weather he can afford it of not. If he can't afford to replace property he steals then he deserves all he gets. Either that or cut his thieving hands off. I'm not PC I believe an eye for an eye !

ajaxgeezer

cakehead wrote: »

Yes ok then so do victims have human rights ? If I own a DVD player and it is kept in my home, my human rights say that no-one should come into my home uninvited and take my property without my consent and then sell it for a tenner in a pub. I know what belongs to me and what doesn't, so does the thief. I should be able to recover my property or monies from the thief regardless of weather he can afford it of not. If he can't afford to replace property he steals then he deserves all he gets. Either that or cut his thieving hands off. I'm not PC I believe an eye for an eye !

I was trying (obviously very badly) to agree with you in a satirical way.

daveturney

VICTORY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have a reply, explanation and an apology.

Thanks to the wiltshire police info I was given, aswell as other help.

"There are statutory fees that you are legally required to pay. These are set by the Government in the form of statutory regulations which they make under section 102(2) of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984."

"If the police recover your vehicle solely as evidence then you will not have to pay for its recovery or storage. If the police use their powers to recover your vehicle because it is illegally, dangerously or obstructively parked or abandoned or broken down, you will have to pay."

Thank you.....the law is the law, if the law had of said that I had to pay..so be it( it would suck).....but the law states that I do not have too.

As for anyone with the mouth to make assumptions that I will create a huge hole in the treasury now I have had my £105 reffunded, please, use your forum time trying to help people next time and stop wasting time, as stated in the forum rules.

Too many ppl to thank, so thankyou all.

derrick

Excellent result, and good on you for keeping on pushing despite the negative comments on this thread, it is exactly what I would have done in the same circumstances.:T

Just a pity it took them so long to put right their mistake.

Clive_Woody

daveturney wrote: »

VICTORY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have a reply, explanation and an apology.

Thanks to the wiltshire police info I was given, aswell as other help.

"There are statutory fees that you are legally required to pay. These are set by the Government in the form of statutory regulations which they make under section 102(2) of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984."

"If the police recover your vehicle solely as evidence then you will not have to pay for its recovery or storage. If the police use their powers to recover your vehicle because it is illegally, dangerously or obstructively parked or abandoned or broken down, you will have to pay."

Thank you.....the law is the law, if the law had of said that I had to pay..so be it( it would suck).....but the law states that I do not have too.

As for anyone with the mouth to make assumptions that I will create a huge hole in the treasury now I have had my £105 reffunded, please, use your forum time trying to help people next time and stop wasting time, as stated in the forum rules.

Too many ppl to thank, so thankyou all.

Excellent news, well done mate for standing up to them.

belfastgirl23

Well done!

I'd have no problem paying the fees if the police had first of all given me an option to arrange to remove the vehicle myself. But in my case by the time they let me know, the car had already been towed from about half a mile from my home (right beside my mechanic!) to a place fifteen miles away. I had to get a taxi to the place, pay for it and pay the towing agency for towing it (£180). The car was written off so I paid the agency another £50 to bring it to the scrapyard - this was apparently cheap as the car was still on the tow truck (thus was being recovered just as the police informed me about it). Of course it wasn't worth claiming on insurance cos it was an old car and would have cost me more in no claims bonus loss. Personally I don't buy the argument that the police did not have the resources to let me know, I think it was just easier to phone the towing agency.

To top it all, two years later I was chased for two years worth of road tax because either the car or the plates had been sold on illegally. Police were very little help in proving that the car was undriveable although this had officially been their reason for recovering it.

It did feel that the only interest the police had was in getting the car gone, although it was recovered on a Sunday morning and wasn't doing any harm where it was. It turned out too that the guy who owned the towing agency was a former policeman so I think there might have been some favours for mates going on too.

And it did feel awful, I felt like a victim of the thief (loss of car worth about £500) but also of the police (costs of recovery etc about £300). The latter also meant that I wasn't able to replace the car for several months...

Surely there should be a better way of doing this? Of course no one ever even suggested that they might get the little b****r that did it.

Casey1709

Am I the only one disapointed at the outcome to this thread?Whilst I'm sympathetic to OP for being a victum of some peasant scum's entertainment, and the Police should follow the law, I am aghast at the amount of time & resource he has used up of the police to save himself, or his insurer, £105, which should be covered by his insurance (unless of course he only has third party cover and not fire, theft or comprehensive). I can't believe the damage to the vehicle would be less than his £100 claims excess (door lock forced, steering column damaged to hot wire, steering lock broken).