fined for a poo we did not commit!

katglasgow

Thanks again for all your comments everyone.

Delta Whisky Hotel - everything you say makes perfect sense, but unfortunately its too late as I have already ready submitted my letter including grounds for dispute. I guess I am hoping they may look at it and decide not to proceed to court hearing (finger, toes and paws crossed). However I can also see that I may have made a mistake here. Ho hum, too late now.

I emailed my letter last monday (26th oct) and also posted it registered, first class post so it should have been signed for on 27th oct. I have had no acknowledgement from them to say that either have been received (guess I should check with the post office). I guess they are just trying to make us sweat a bit, but I think its very bad manners considering all the other office failures that they have made.
If they do decide to proceed with a hearing - do they have to let us know within a certain period of time?

Obviously until we know for certain whether its going ahead or not theres no point wasting too much time preparing for it. My thoughts at the moment are that first of all I would like to see the video footage to see if they can prove the dogs position. We can probably back this up by revisting the site and taking a photograph with my husband and dog in the same spot and me taking photo from the position of the warden. I think this would show that it is impossible to determine anything from this position. Only other thoughts we had would be to survey wider area for number of visible dog poos to argue that they were more of less guaranteed to find one in the area.

zaxdog

Anyone who knows Paisley Road West knows how busy it is. No way anyone could tell from there IMHO!!!

katglasgow

Well I have now had a letter saying that they have referred the matter to the procurator fiscal which means we will get a hearing and the fine will not be sent to a debt collection agency. No apologies for loss of letters or anything obviously!!
Delta Whisky - does this mean it will definitely go to a hearing, or is there a possibility the procurator fiscal may decide not to take it further? ...And do you have any idea how long we may have until we get a hearing date or how much time we would have to prepare?
They did also say in their letter that there is no film footage of the alleged incident, only of the conversation which took place afterwards with my husband.
We will revisit site and I will ask my husband to stand where he was with the dog and I will take photos of them both from the warden's position. Hopefully this will back up that from that distance it is not possible to tell what position the dog was in.
We will also scan the area and photograph high prevalence of dog poo.
Are there any other sensible ways we can prepare:
- witness statements from people who have regularly witnessed my husband picking up after our dog?
- witness statements from dog sitter to testify our dog squats to pee?
tempted to do a freedom of information request to find out how many fixed penalties they use a month, how many are appealed, and whether any have been successful but think I am just being petty?

DeltaWhiskyHotel

Up to PF now, whether it is passed to Sheriff/Justice, but as it is a slightly different procedure from normal prosecutions I suspect that the PF may not have the same choice.
How long it takes - is like asking how long a bit of string is. In my experience you may be looking at a couple of months, but may depend on how busy the courts are.
Your best evidence would be a witness of the actual event. What your husband usually does is really a bit irrelevant I'm afraid. I believe it all may hinge on the wardens evidence and whether the 'judge' believes their version of the event. If there were two of them then that would strengthen the case. The judge either believes they witnessed the event clearly or not.
A FOI request could be made, but I'm not sure what help that would be. Each case is separate - there's no real useful correlation that I can see.

katglasgow

Now I am starting to panic! I have some morephotos taken from positionof warden - uyou can barely even see there is a dog never mind what position it's in. It seems I am now completely reliant on a sensible unbiased pf. Fingers crossed .

katglasgow

Just reporting back it's now 6 + months and there has been no response from the procurator fiscal which hopefully means there is no case to answer.
We continue to act as responsible dog owners and pick up wherever we go. ☺��