Seems the law and common sense are two distant relatives who no longer talk...

[Neil]

Seems the law and common sense are two distant relatives who no longer talk to each other... http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/sc...6908-21431627/ Unemployed Stewart Smith, 36, had just bought a £3 T-shirt at a charity shop when he accidentally dropped the £10 note and his receipt. He walked on a few yards before being collared by two beat cops, who hit him with a £50 fixed penalty fine.

[bassman]

That's crazy. For some reason I'm reminded of Beverly Hills Cop. "What's the charge for being thrown out of a car? Jaywalking?!?!?"

[DjfunkmasterG]

That's crazy. For some reason I'm reminded of Beverly Hills Cop. "What's the charge for being thrown out of a car? Jaywalking?!?!?" That was a great moment in that movie.

[MinionZombie]

Seems the law and common sense are two distant relatives who no longer talk to each other... http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/sc...6908-21431627/ Unemployed Stewart Smith, 36, had just bought a £3 T-shirt at a charity shop when he accidentally dropped the £10 note and his receipt. He walked on a few yards before being collared by two beat cops, who hit him with a £50 fixed penalty fine. Common sense - from the current public service - you're having a laugh, aintcha? Speaking of the rozzers, what about all that palava about coppers at the Met waterboarding folks in custody to extra information? Bloody nora - literally "police state" kind of stuff! These numpties handing out fines are twats, put simply, all too keen to lay down "the law" and use their "power" with absolutely no thought put into things, it's not the first time, and it's not the last. This stupid crap goes on every day in Brown's Britain.

[Publius]

The problem seems to be not with the law itself but with those who enforce it. Assuming Mr. Smith is telling the truth to the media, he can probably fight the charge and get a result like in this similar case.

[MinionZombie]

The problem seems to be not with the law itself but with those who enforce it. Assuming Mr. Smith is telling the truth to the media, he can probably fight the charge and get a result like in this similar case. Nope, the law is also at fault. For one thing, there's too many of them now, and nobody actually knows where they stand, and many "big name" laws have proven to be not only controversial, but unenforceable and ill-thought-out. Then there's "smaller" laws like these things relating to fixed penalty notices ... give those "powers" to a bunch of numpties or vindictively power hungry tossers, and you end up with crap like the aforementioned debacle.

[Publius]

Nope, the law is also at fault. For one thing, there's too many of them now, and nobody actually knows where they stand, and many "big name" laws have proven to be not only controversial, but unenforceable and ill-thought-out. Then there's "smaller" laws like these things relating to fixed penalty notices ... give those "powers" to a bunch of numpties or vindictively power hungry tossers, and you end up with crap like the aforementioned debacle. You certainly won't find me arguing that there aren't too many laws, but littering? Surely few people expect that throwing rubbish on the street should be legal. The problem here is not the law (littering should be illegal) but an abuse of discretion by the officers charged with enforcing it (no reasonable person would conclude that Mr. Smith meant to throw away a £10 note, so no reasonable person would conclude that dropping the receipt was an intentional act). Again, assuming the accuracy of Mr. Smith's account. Admittedly, there is another assumption I'm making: in criminal law there is normally a mental state required for guilt. Many criminal statutes specify the required mental state, typically through words such as "intentionally," "knowingly," "recklessly," "maliciously," etc. When no mental state is specified, the minimum mental state is usually presumed to be recklessness. If the particular ordinance Mr. Smith was charged with violating sets a lower standard than recklessness or imposes strict liability then yes, I would agree that there's a problem with the law itself. But the link I posted to a different similar case suggests that, at least in that case, the ordinance either implicitly or explicitly did have a meaningful mental state requirement.

[MinionZombie]

Oh indeed, in this case the law is fine - littering is bad, mmkay - but I ended up talking more generally as you saw. Indeed, in this particular case, it's the numpty with "teh powerz!111!1!!111!!!" who are the morons. It's shocking that there's people with such an epic lack of common sense working in the public service ... but if they had any common sense, their votes wouldn't be getting bought by Labour, so...