Fine for litter that isn’t mine.

Okell

born_again said:

If all they have is an address and nothing else, then even if the pizza was delivered to your address how could they prove it was you rather than your daughter (or vice versa) who deposited it?

It would on the basis of the householder (council tax payer) who would receive it given the pizza boxes were found next to a waste bin in plastic sacks...

I'm not sure I follow.  Why would being a council tax payer be evidence that anyone had committed a criminal offence?

If that line of reasoning were a valid form of argument then the police wouldn't need to send a s172 request to the Registered Keeper of a vehicle caught speeding as it wouldn't matter who was driving.  They could just prosecute and convict the Registered Keeper.

But that isn't how it works because in order to be convicted of a criminal offence the prosecution have to prove beyond reasonable doubt that you committed the offence.  A bit of litter with an address on it is not evidence that any particular person living at that address "deposited" it.

In this case more than one person lives at the address, so if the only evidence the council has is an address, how would they know which person living at that address to prosecute?

Several posters have also already suggested various reasonable explanations as to why the pizza box might have the OP's address on it yet the OP have no other connection to it whatsoever.

On what the OP has told us I think it doubtful that he could be convicted.  The council might not even prosecute.

But it's up to the OP how he wants to handle it.  The surest way to avoid all possibility of being convicted is to pay the FPN.

RefluentBeans

I think this highlights the issue with the FPN system. I think we can all agree that the legal occupier/owner of a house/resident (whoever people feel it should be) shouldn’t be expected to go curb crawling to check that no one has ordered something to their house and left their address and then dumped the packaging (still with address). 

There is no right to appeal for these FPN, and I think that is wrong. Ultimately, these fines could be issued to 99.9% of the correct people but that .1% of people should be allowed to appeal their charges (as should other people if the evidence isn’t strong). 

Strong arm tactics like ‘pay now or we’ll take you to court and press charges’ are the tactics of slimy car parking companies. We should be holding our councils to a higher standard than that, in my opinion. 

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

Ju. said:

Okell said:

@Ju.  -  the FPN should specify what the offence is and should refer to a particular section of a particular piece of legislation.  what is it in your case?

eg s87(1) Environmental Protection Act 1990 (legislation.gov.uk)


PS  -  as someone has already mentioned it looks like Pepipoo is down and out for the moment (possibly permanently).  Go to the Non-motoring legal advice board at FTLA:  Non-motoring legal advice (ftla.uk)

They’ve just quoted section 87.

I assume the fine is somewhere up to £150 whereas the maximum fine a court could impose is £2500. 

With regards to the council fishing, a few threads over the years have mentioned an invitation for an interview under caution, this is where people think it's their chance to state their case but is really for the council to get you to say something to incriminate yourself. 

Is the jump to FPN because the council think they have a stronger case or is it a stronger bluff? 

TELLIT01

Really just thinking aloud here but, if there was only one person living at the address it would be more understandable if a package with an address but no name was presumed to be associated with the person at that address.  The question is, how does a council decide who they are going to charge with littering if there are multiple people living at an address? Pick one at random from those on the electoral register; choose the person who pay the Council Tax?

Grumpy_chap

I have said a few posts up that I would be minded to take my chance with the Magistrates Court, but also on a different day would just pay the (assumed relatively small) FPN as "go away" money.

The latest posts tend to reinforce me towards the refusal of the FPN and take the Magistrate Court route, assuming the Local Authority follow on.
I also acknowledge this is easy for me to say when it is not me that will have the hassle of it all.

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

Grumpy_chap said:

I also acknowledge this is easy for me to say when it is not me that will have the hassle of it all.

This is the issue really, can you just turn up at a Magistrates Court and defend yourself?

I would assume it's prudent to have representation which isn't going to be cheap. I've no idea, do the such courts awards costs if you are found innocent? 

Okell said: Here's an example from FTLA where the council has sent out a speculative invoice for a civil charge against just an address     - no named person!

Unauthorised Bay Use - Brighton (ftla.uk)

I think that is a good example of fishing, they either hope the person at the address pays, tries to explain and admits it was them or says who the materials actually belonged to so they don't have to pay. 

J63320

born_again said:

….
Maybe one for local councillor to get involved in.

Definitely approach one of your local councillors. It always surprises me how many posts on this forum involve disputes with a local council, but people rarely ask for help from their councillors. That’s what they’re there for - and they ought to want to help because it might get you to vote for them next time. In this case they might have a better overview of the situation than the council people who are just trying to get you to pay up - e.g. maybe the events at this venue have caused problems for others.

Okell

J63320 said:

born_again said:

….
Maybe one for local councillor to get involved in.

Definitely approach one of your local councillors. It always surprises me how many posts on this forum involve disputes with a local council, but people rarely ask for help from their councillors. That’s what they’re there for - and they ought to want to help because it might get you to vote for them next time...

If I were a local councillor I wouldn't touch this with a bargepole as I suspect it would be against the code of conduct to get involved in a situation where my council was alleging that a resident had committed a criminal offence.  They usually won't even get involved in parking cases - and rightly so.

Justice needs to be seen to be done and the political intervention of a councillor would look awful.  It would create an opportunity to raise all sorts of allegation of wrongdoing, improper intervention in the council's operational working* and possibly even corruption.  Think about the wider ranging implications of "... they ought to want to help because it might get you to vote for them next time..."

That doesn't sound right.


* It would be perfectly proper for a councillor to have input to council policy making - eg the council shouldn't pursue littering offences where the only evidence is an address on the litter because that isn't evidence of who committed the offence - but they shouldn't get involved in individual cases

Okell

FPN for litter that isn’t mine (ftla.uk)

powerful_Rogue

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head said:

Grumpy_chap said:

I also acknowledge this is easy for me to say when it is not me that will have the hassle of it all.

This is the issue really, can you just turn up at a Magistrates Court and defend yourself?

I would assume it's prudent to have representation which isn't going to be cheap. I've no idea, do the such courts awards costs if you are found innocent? 

Okell said: Here's an example from FTLA where the council has sent out a speculative invoice for a civil charge against just an address     - no named person!

Unauthorised Bay Use - Brighton (ftla.uk)

I think that is a good example of fishing, they either hope the person at the address pays, tries to explain and admits it was them or says who the materials actually belonged to so they don't have to pay. 

Yup, you can defend yourself in magistrates court.
In regards to claiming costs back if found innocent, that's at the discretion of the court.