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Friend's Name and Address used by Fare Dodger. Prosecuted.

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DaveNewcastle

DaveNewcastle

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It's unfortunate that I hadn't seen this enquiry earlier. The advice from cuccir, Puffing_Devil and najaB is reliable.
This MUST be handled by a law firm licensed in England (not Scotland) and there is NO POINT in choosing a firm who claims to specialise in Railway fare evasion.
The reason for this is that there is nothing at all about Railway Law that is significant her - it is about 'identity' and nothing else.
There is also no point in speaking to the Courts, as the case has been 'discharged'. It is no longer a Court matter and cannot be re-opened by the Court.
There is an opportunity to make a Statutory Declaration which, although 'out of time', can be justified on the exceptional circumstances. That will 'undo' some of the legal process, including cancelling the fine, though it does not, in itself, lead to an automatic removal of the Criminal Conviction.
If that fails, then an Application can be made to the Criminal Court of Appeal in the name of the accused friend against the Magistrates Court who convicted him. Some law firms might want to name the Director of Public Prosecutions as a second Defendant, for reasons I won't go into here, because it would have been a Private Prosecution which the DPP could, technically, have stopped.

I hope this helps - Good luck
 
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6Gman

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Orkneytim said:
Dear Fellow Forum Members,

In spite of trying to reason with the court, being aboard when the offence was committed does not appear make him innocent.
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Can you explain what form this reasoning with the court has taken?

(Apologies if it's somewhere on the thread.)
 
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wildcard

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One thing the Op’s friend should consider for the future is their use of a publically accessible but otherwise largely unattended address for official correspondence. I don’t know what methods TOC’s use to validate name against address but home addresses for company directors , the public version of the electoral register plus reverse phone lookup services like 142.com are all available. They will also use services like Experian and possibly data from the utility companies. It’s sensible to opt out , go ex directory or use a proxy address wherever possible - for example your agents ,accountants or lawyers business address.
If the post is not to be forwarded - don’t let it be binned without first shredding all documents which show a name and address.
 
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jkdd77

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The time limit is 21 days from becoming aware of the conviction, so, as I understand it, a statutory declaration (SD) would not necessarily be 'out of time', depending on precise timescales, although it sounds like the OP's friend might have spend the period in fruitless informal engagement with the court.

The form for making a statutory declaration is here: http://www.justice.gov.uk/courts/pr...37-statutory-declaration-revised-feb-2014.pdf

If the SD is granted, the conviction will be quashed for the time being, but the criminal proceedings will remain live and the TOC may continue with the prosecution, at which point the OP's friend will be able to plead not guilty and to present evidence that he could not have committed the offence. In practice, it is likely that the TOC will drop the prosecution once such evidence is provided to them.
 
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ainsworth74

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I have had to create three threads (see here, here and here) and delete a dozen or more posts in order to get this thread back to a state in which is actually helpful to the OP. As a reminder in the strongest possible terms when someone posts in this section of the forum looking for advice on how to deal with a prosecution or other dispute any responses should be focused solely on helping the OP in resolving the issue. Wider postings on, for example, whether or not the policy or law being applied is "fair" or "reasonable" are off-topic and not helpful in resolving the matter.

Guidance for those wishing to provide advice can be found here and I am repeating it below:

IanXC said:
Guidance for those giving advice

The purpose of the Disputes and Prosecutions forum is to provide advice for anyone who has encountered difficulties during or after their rail journey.

Regardless of whether the person in question admits their guilt, or believes that they are completely innocent, everyone who seeks help is entitled to receive advice. We would usually expect these 4 aims to be addressed in a disputes thread:

1. Establish the facts of the case
2. Ensure the correct process was followed by the rail official dealing with the issue
3. Check the OP understands what has happened
4. Explain the options available to resolve the matter to the OP

For the benefit of the OP we will not permit off topic discussion, any such posts are likely to be deleted. For instance a debate about whether current rail industry practice could be improved, or about the complex nature of the railway ticketing system is not helpful to the OP. The Disputes section of the RailUK Fares & Ticketing Guide covers current practice; should you wish to discuss such practices or your ideas for changes to them, you must post this in a separate thread in the appropriate forum.

If you spot any problem in a particular thread, please report relevant post(s) to us using the report button (
picture.php
) rather than calling for moderator action in public. Due to the sheer number of posts on this forum, we are unable to review every single thread therefore unless reported to us, we may not notice every request made in this manner.
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If anyone has any questions about the above requirements or has questions about any other matter they are welcome to use the "Contact Us" button at the bottom of every page on the Forum or to report this post.
 
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