Naughty Copper

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/2552131/A-police-officer-is-caught-trying-to-remove-a-clamp-from-an-unmarked-car-with-a-set-of-bolt-cutters.html

What a pri ck!

 

Even better:

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/2550190/Girl-police-worker-and-WPc-have-sex-with-five-cops-in-orgy-shame.html
Gotta read the sun more... maybe

 

Is conspiring to commit criminal damage not a crime?

Why did the force pay the fine, my company won't pay my parking tickets.

 

The scandalous story says the WPC and civvy support worker were "pretty". If the female in question had a glass eye, leprosy and leg-irons she would,according to those *********,be a "stunner" .

 

Do you know what, I'm going to go out on a limb here and say fair play to her, I was in the same situation I did the same to be honest!

Has anyone here been clamped by one of those private clamping firms? I was clamped and the bloke demanded I pay £300 to have the clamp removed, I had 1 wheel in a yellow line and was out of the van for all of 2 minutes, wasn't blocking any traffic or causing an obstruction at all, yet he still decided to clamp me.

Upon refusing to pay the fine, he said that the clamp would remain on the van and would the fine would increase by £50 each day that passed. As soon as he left, I let alot of air out of the tyre, drove out of the clamp, pumped up the tyre and promptly did one. I never heard another word from them, which leads me to suspect this throbber was flying solo.

edited for spelling

 

Private clampers cannot fine you, they can only charge you to release the clamp, if you can remove it without damaging it then that's the end of it. If you damage it you will have to pay for it's repair/replacement or be done for criminal damage.

 

I agree with what the previous replies are saying but if it was my own car i would probably do the same. purely because these clamping cnuts will wait for you behind a wall, watch you leave the car then clamp it rather than giving you an advisory warning. Sure they are going to clamp as many vehicles as possible to rake in the revenue. However how many times have we heard of emergency service vehicles, disabled badge holders, even hearses being clamped. How can they get away with this s**t and then levy a £2,500 fine for tampering with the clamps.

 

1. Been done.

2. If he was supposed to be responding to the scrotes in my house & nicking my TV at the time I'd rather some jobsworth hadn't clamped his car. Isn't obstructing a constable an offence?

 

I can see an arguement for the officers actions. if the car was needed for duty (ie it's an unmarked patrol car, or specialist vehicle which cannot be replaced) and he hasn't got time to wait for the potentially lenghty unlocking process, then it would be justified, it's realease is in the public interest, and so long as the company is atleast compensated for the damage, then fair enough.

on the other hand if the car can sit there for a few hours without comprimising anything (for example it's being used as a general runabout car for non-immediate responce purposes, as all the marked ones are in use aswell) then pay the fine, and wait for it to be released. then don't be stupid enough to park it there again.

 

Did they see you remove the clamp using force? Did they recover the clamp (Ie; cut it off and throw it in a canal.)
Can they prove you removed it? I think there is the small matter of evidence and witnesses required before the Plod are going to start the paperwork. They really do have better things to do

Most clampers are operating on the boundaries of the law. There is no legal code of practice or license scheme for clampers, and many are just thugs.

There favourite targets are mums with kids in supermarket car parks. They then demand hundreds of pounds for release. This is legally no different than taking monies under duress and has on occasions resulted in the clampers being arrested.

There is also no such offence as tampering with a clamp. It's possibly criminal damage, but the Police are not likely to be interested, but if you do cut the clamp off, take it away and lose it!

And as CQMS has pointed out, only HM Courts can fine you. These are charges.

That copper needs a larger pair of bolt cutters anyway. 26" pair should do it.

 

If i were clamped, which luckily it has never happened to me yet, i would rather go buy a cheap knife and stab my own tyre to let the air out to drive off the clamp, then spend fifty quid or so for a replacement tyre, than give brass to those bloody robbers. Hell, Turpin was hung for highway robbery!

 

Fifty quid for a tyre? What do you drive a scooter?

 

Or buy a pencil and a pump, use the pencil to let the air out of the valve, drive out, then pump up and go; no new tyre required.

And whilst they can be challenged in court, police and various hi-vis enforcement types can issue fixed penalty notices, which are to all intents and purposes fines.

 

The whole point of fixed penalty notices is that they are just that, penalties, backed by law. The "fine" issued by a clamping company is not legally enforceable, it is a charge for removing the clamp. If you can get the clamp off without damage then you don't have to pay it, you could for example call a locksmith out to pick the lock open. The key (didja see what I did there) is damage, if you damage it then you are open to prosecution, the same if you remove and retain or dispose of the clamp. The clamping company would then have to report the "crime", it's unlikely that plod will be that interested and even if they are the evidence is pretty thin, they may know the VRN of the vehicle they attached it to, but they don't know who removed it, it may have been stolen by someone else, Without evidence they're screwed.

 

In Scotland, wheel-clamping on private land is illegal. It was banned by the case of Black v Carmichael 1992 SCCR 709, when wheel-clamping was found to constitute extortion and theft.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheel_clamp

On public roads only the police and local authorities can clamp you

Some civilisation north of the border me thinks.