BARRISTER FINED FOR USING DEAD MOTHER’S BLUE BADGE
Two motorists who attempted to avoid paying parking charges by fraudulently using disabled ‘blue-badge’ parking permits have been fined by Croydon magistrates.
The barrister displayed his dead mother’s disabled parking permit in his car as he worked in Croydon Crown Court on 22 April.
He pleaded guilty, in his absence, to using the blue badge in Fairfield Road, and was fined £60 and ordered to pay costs of £325.
Croydon magistrates, on 24 November, were told that a civil enforcement officer noted that the disabled parking permit displayed in a parked car had expired. The car was removed and subsequent enquiries revealed that the permit had been issued by Ealing council to the man’s mother, who had died in July last year.
In another blue-badge fraud case on the same day a Beckenham woman was fined £60 and ordered to pay costs of £325.
The court was told that the 40-year-old, who did not attend court, was seen parking her car in Sydenham Road, Croydon, on 12 February and displaying a blue badge without the badgeholder being present.
She initially appealed the penalty charge, claiming that her nephew, the registered badgeholder, was with her at the time. But following investigation and interview by the council’s corporate fraud team she made a full admission, stating that she had illegally parked the car while she was at work.
Councillor Mark Watson, Croydon’s cabinet member for communities, safety and justice Cllr Mark Watson said: “Once again, selfish motorists have thought they could flout the law by callously abusing a facility designed make life easier for those among us who are not quite so able.
“And, once again, they’ve learned to the cost of their wallet and, more importantly, their reputation, that Croydon is not the place to attempt this antisocial crime. “Like others before them, they’ve been caught and made to pay the price.” (Source: Croydon council press release)