Aldershot Magistrates Court -Hampshire

[hantsman1205]

Happen to be in there today for another matter in the afternoon session, but I looked at the court list for the morning session, 52 Defendant's/cases - South West Trains, can only assume it was fare evasion/no ticket ect.

 

[bb21]

I assume that is just one of the courts that SWT use?

 

[DaveNewcastle]

Another day, another Court. Another bunch of Prosecutions against passengers travelling without a valid ticket.

It's much the same across most of England, although some Operators are much more vigourous than others (in just the same way as some of those Operators face much more fares abuse than others).

 

[cuccir]

Interesting - so do rail-related offences account for a significant percentage of magistrates court's time? 5%? 10%? More? Or am I misjudging how many courts there are and cases per day?

 

[Flamingo]

I suppose it shows how endemic fare evasion is, and what TOC's are up against trying to get a large proportion of passengers to pay their way...

 

[thebigcheese]

Can't be much fun being a Magistrate... a morning of train tickets then an afternoon of drink drivers

 

[anme]

I suppose it shows how endemic fare evasion is, and what TOC's are up against trying to get a large proportion of passengers to pay their way...

We can't tell that without knowing how many cases are heard in other courts, and how many people are prosecuted for fare evasion in Aldershot on other days.

In principle, this could be a year's worth of cases (or whatever the maximum time is that a prosecution must be brought). I'm not saying that is the case, but this statistic doesn't tell us much in isolation.

We also don't know how many people will be found guilty.

 

[DaveNewcastle]

We can't tell that without knowing how many cases are heard in other courts, . . . .

The vast majority of cases are heard in a batch, in the same session. Typically, there may be another similar batch in the same Court in 2 or 4 week's time.

We also don't know how many people will be found guilty.

The majority do not attend and Judgement is given in favour of the Claimant (the Railway Company).

 

[34D]

The majority do not attend and Judgement is given in favour of the Claimant (the Railway Company).

Claimant? Wrong court, surely? They are the Prosecutor in the arena in question.