A DRIVER was left baffled after receiving a £30 fine for playing music too loudly on his car radio.
Christopher Cureton, of Seacombe, was listening to the rock band The Killers’ hit, Human, as he drove along Brighton Street, Wallasey, at around 10pm after an eight hour shift on a Friday night.
But before the 41-year-old mechanic made it home to meet his wife Kristen for a few drinks, he was pulled over by police and given a fixed penalty notice.
He said: “I’m not some boy racer with a big sound system fitted in my boot.
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“I’m a dad who was driving home from work in a Vauxhall Astra, listening to some music, at what I thought was an acceptable level on my standard factory fitted car radio.
“I didn’t even know you could get a ticket for playing your radio too loud.”
Christopher’s ticket said he was producing “excessive noise” in a manner which “could have been avoided by the exercise of reasonable care”.
He appealed the fine and has been asked to attend Birkenhead Magistrates’ Court on February 5, next year.
The dad-of-one added: “It seems like such a silly thing but I’ve appealed the ticket on principle. If there is a legal level of noise that I exceeded I will willingly pay my fine, however when the only evidence is the opinion of a police officer, I feel by paying it I could be setting a precedent for laws to be made up as and when the police suit. I’m still totally baffled and feel like this whole situation is unfair and unjust.”
A Merseyside police spokesman said: “We can confirm that on Friday, August 7, an officer issued a Fixed Penalty Notice to a motorist for an incident involving anti-social behaviour in connection with use of a vehicle.
“Specifically this offence was ‘using a motor vehicle in a manner to cause excessive noise’ in the residential area of Brighton Street, Wallasey.”
Anna is the landlady of the Raccoon Arms. She lives in the Monbazillac area of South West France and still takes a keen interest in British politics.
{ 32 comments }
Good.
The Private Police State
http://youve-been-cromwelled.org/?p=1079
I do reccomend that you read Olly’s story on the link above. Horrifying.
They are out of control.
Big Brother knows best.
I have heard that the question to ask when you are stopped by a police officer, rail enforcement officer or anyone else, is “Are you detaining me?”. If the official has any clue about the law (which he or she may not, of course – see Olly’s story), he or she will then appreciate the need either to let you go or to have legal support for your detention. Perhaps contributors with legal expertise could say whether this is the right question to ask.
there’s gotta be more to this than meets the eye – surely? Without a specific statute and an objective measure (eg a noise level meter) then we really are in trouble…..
Not to mention some independent witnesses.
Good job there was not a demo nearby.
Guilty until proven innocent has rather taken on some sinister, if oddly selective (M’Lord, Baroness, officer, please excuse the intrusion whilst making a mockery of the law that mere mortals would be crucified for transgressing to even a fraction that you have) manifestations.
I have lost count where lawmakers and enforcers do not have a clue what is or is not ‘legal’, seem to have vast powers to ‘interpret’ vague levels of waffle like ‘reasonableness’ or due care, etc, and do so on whim, alone, backed by a state machine that presumes all its employees are saints. And in near all cases, the default is not spirit but letter of the law, as it usually means a meaty fine or bonus-accruing box-tick.
“
Lawful excuse?
About a year ago, I pulled up at the lights and started to think I might have thrown a piston or something. A dreadful noise seemed to be coming from all around me. A fluttery feeling in my chest then made me’ think I might be about to have a heart attack.
Then I saw, in my rear view, a car – little boy racer type, with blacked-out windows. The noise was his stereo -cranked up so loud o could hear it (and feel it) in my Jeep, a car’s length in front, with my own radio on and the windows wound up…
I’ve often been in our local shopping street when some idiot drives by with the gain turned up to eleven. Shops windows vibrate, old people fall off their zimmers at the noise. This produces instantaneous kill urges, and visions of his bullet-riddled corpse draped across his own bonnet, while the pedestrians around me shake my hand and pat my back for performing this public duty. And this is during the day.
Same thing at night? Residential district? Do Magistrates Courts have the ability to hand out the death penalty?
Glad to see it’s not just me who has these dreams!
Full on Lenko
Good man. If his story really is that black and white, it’s time that a philanthropic fund was set up to help such people fight this kind of nonsense to the highest court possible.
As he quite rightly says, it would be money invested wisely to stop such things becoming commonplace and directed at every one of us.
I am trying to contact him with just such an aim in mind Dick……
Why not donate the money to the Claire House Hospice? It’s old non-news.
Good find Brian – and David Kirwin again too!
Yes, I should have checked the dates. Falling asleep on the job again, sorry!
Here’s a bit more research on the matter of noisy car stereos that you might find useful. Also, in New York City, if a car stereo is “plainly audible” from 25 feet away, a police officer can issue a $150 fine for the first offence rising to $1,050 for the third.
Wonder if the Merseyside cops are similarly vigilant with the mobile boom-boxes that some kids drive?
Whatever happened to common sense policing?
The rise of “paracops” is as worrying as the abandonment of service by the “proper” cops.
Is Brian a troll, an idiot, or an example of “care in the community”?
Aren’t they all pretty much the same thing?
I’m not The Cowboy Online so it’s none of those categories. Best wishes to your right hand.
For the sake of efficacy I should think to use both hands when throttling a troll.
Throttling a troll – is that what they call playing the pink trombone on Brokeback Mountain? Read Anna’s comment at 16.
Anna, have you or has anybody got the “not the nine o’clock news” sketch where the copper was hauled up against his superior for silly charges? That should be the flag for this nonsense.
Basically the Honey moon has ran out for Con-Dem and the Stasi State created by Brown is starting to flex its muscles again daring anybody to stop them.
It really has got to the stage where we have to start fighting back, before the gulags are opened for business under the new leader Ed Milliband who has been bought by UNITE
as posted (on AT)- the Brits are a pretty reasonable bunch, by and large , prone to a “live and let live” approach to life., but once wound up get pretty ugly – that point may be approaching. And it might not be pretty……….
i play classic fm , with my van window wide open, it annoys the hell out of young people walking down the pavement, ps im sixty and slightly deaf!
Not the Nine o Clock News sketch on…
http://www.anenglishmanscastle.com/archives/000452.html
Mr. Cureton
Did he have a decibel meter? If not then case dismissed. It’s a log scale so I doubt many people can accutately rate a sound on this scale. Yes, car radios and sound systems can be a real nuisance, but usually a fleeting one as they are in motion. I console myself with the thought that the idiot behind the wheel is causing their own deafness.
Chalcedon