[url]http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/2565109.stm[/url]
Wednesday, 11 December, 2002, 12:10 GMT

Man's anger at 'crazy car decision'


The Toyota Picnic is blocking Mr Windo's garage
[img]http://news.bbc.co.uk/media/images/38576000/jpg/_38576133_dumpedcar300.jpg[/img]

Police have told a Gloucester man he risks breaking the law if he forces his way into a vehicle which has been parked in his drive, blocking his own car in a garage.
The mystery car has been parked across Roger Windo's drive since Sunday morning.
He has established it does not belong to any of his neighbours in Kingsholm Road.
But neither the police nor Gloucester City Council will help because the T-reg Toyota Picnic is not causing a public obstruction.



Roger Windo: " I can't get my own car out of the garage through no fault of my own "


Police told Mr Windo they could not disclose the identity of the owner because giving him the information would break data-protection legislation.

They also warned him he could face prosecution for criminal damage if he tried to break into the vehicle to move it.

"It's crazy," said Mr Windo. "I have a relative in hospital in Standish and have had to take a taxi to visit them, because I can't get my own car out of the garage through no fault of my own.

'Criminal damage'

"But the police say the car is legal because it is taxed."

"And because it is on private property it is not causing a public obstruction, so there is nothing they can do."

A spokesman for Gloucester Police said: "The van is in private property."

"If it was causing an obstruction we would get it towed away, but now we have handed the matter over to the city council."

Seven days

"The van is actually registered to a leasehold company and they won't tell us who was driving it at the time."

A spokesman for Gloucester City Council said it would take action when it received official notification of the vehicle in writing.

It would then place a sticker on the vehicle, giving the owner a further seven days in which to remove it.
 

Hmmm... I don't have a CLUE how the window got broken, or how the car was moved.
All I heard was breaking glass at 2 in the morning!!!!

Remember if the glove don't fit, you must acquit!!!

Yep, it must really suck to be "civilized"...

This thread shoud read "Thank your lucky stars you're not an englishman"

I think this problem solves itself in most areas of the U.S.

If this happened to me, I'd hook up my 4X4 to that thing and yank it down the road and leave it across both lanes of traffic . Then it would be a public obstruction[;)]

point proven.
thanks capitalist.

I would wait patiently for the owner to return. Then I would follow them home, and park my car in their driveway for seven days.

I would have not notified the police, dowsed the interior with alcohol, run it into my garage, then called the police and sued the owner.

The don't have tow trucks in England???

And if it is on private property, isn't this trespassing???

Crazy inbreds. [:D]

I just popped out of the house and there was the bloody thing all on fire!  I didn't know what to do, so in a moment of panic, I took an axe and smashed into it thinking that I could vent the flames.  Oh, the humanity!

Good christ man, if some assclown left their car in my driveway I could think of a whole lot of ways to get rid of it.  

I spoke to Mrs 95th Foot about this. She is from Scotland, whose legal system is quite different from that of England, but she wonders why Mr Windo just doesn't have the thing towed, and pay for it himself, just to rid himself of the hassle. Of course, there is no guarantee he'll ever get his money back, since the leasehold company is mum on who's (likely) responsible. They don't want to incur the wrath of the lessee, I should imagine.

The legal fees, if he can get a solicitor to help him recoup the towing costs, and probable storage costs, if he somehow gets charged for putting somebody else's car in a holding garage, would probably be more than the parking and storage fees.

And, in the UK, if you lose the case, YOU are liable to pay ALL costs on BOTH sides.

Either way, Mr Windo is f*****d.

When Mrs 95th Foot and I got married, we weren't sure whether we should live in England (where all the jobs are in the UK) or in the USA. I'm SOOOO glad we stayed here. Even the People's Republik of Massachusetts is a relative bed of libertarian freedom compared to the United Kingdom....[rolleyes]

This guy just needs to deal with the problem himself and not get the "authorities" involved at all.

They already are, and so is the media. If Mr Windo does anything that even looks illegal, the police will be all over him like a cheap suit, just to look even-handed in the eyes of the liberal press.

And then Mr Windo would have to pay for damage to the car, and be answerable to Her Majesty's Govt. for A) criminal damage to an automobile and B) for environmental clean up costs for oil, gas and battery acid spilled on the driveway. And he'd probably get arrested for environmental vandalism for it as well.

In the UK, a man's home is NOT his castle.

Sadly, if he borrowed a friends car and towed
it out onto the public highway and dumped it
there, he'd probably be responsible for the
cost of the council towing it away.

And we look down on you colonials for your litigous society!

I hang my head in shame...

He should just notify the police that there are guns in the van.  They'll tear that thing apart in minutes.

He should just build a fence around his driveway with a gate so the van cannot leave and then charge whomever parked it there a substantial sum to remove it.

If he didn't call the police in the first place he could have had it stripped and sold all the parts to the English underground.  The Russian car thieves around here would have had it "disappeared" a long time ago.

Put the van on dollies, wheel it out into the street, remove the van from the dollies and NOW it is a public obstruction. No breaking in to do it.

A locksmith can't cost THAT much in gay olde England, what?

Or how it ended up in the middle of the street "ON FIRE".

"Hello, 911 operator? There is an abandoned car on fire in my driveway"

Okay....the first thing you do is get a syringe.  It doesn't have to be one for IV use.....a small basteing syringe will work.    Now, buy a tin of sardines, collect a little dog poo, or your poo if it makes you feel better(I recoomend a personal poo sample after a night of abusing guiness and sausage.  You may also want to collect other smelly things....be imaginative.  Next combine aforementioned ingrediants into a jar. Now, piss into it( a concentrated urine, like the kind after a night of abusing guiness works well).  Put the lid on the jar and shake rigorously. If you like, put the jar out in the sun for a day to give the concauction time to "rippen".  Next,   with the solid btis settled at the bottom, load the syringe with liquid.  Now, preferably at night,  ease the needle into and foam or rubber areas around the windows, depress the plunger  and that's  it.  Repeat as necessary.  
I can only imagine this works best with  a cloth interior.  If the interior isnt cloth, try to let the said liquid hit the carpet on the floor.
Do this and that rat will never park on your property again.  Trust me.

-HS

Thank you for that repugnant thought, but using the fox urine you buy at the store works just as well[;)]

A frightening glimpse of liberal utopia, or just another reason to laugh at socialist stupidity? [dracula]

"liberal utopia"? "socialist stupidity"? How does one tell the difference between them? [:D]
.................................
"Suppose I am a politician. Suppose I am an idiot. But I repeat myself."
- --MARK TWAIN

Note to self:  NEVER go to England.  

That's what I was going to say. Just pay some guy from a garage to move it 30 feed into the road. Done in 30 seconds and cost maybe $20.

Note to self: When visiting England parking is FREE and plentiful.

What a crock of shite. I can't believe that people are actually that dumb. Wait, yes I can. I forgot we are talking about England.

Good idea CAPITALIST,  much less of a hassle too!

-HS

And when the police come to see the car, they will ask, how did it get there? Mr Windo will lie and say, I don't know. The police will go to his neighbors in this crowded neighborhood (see the pic- row houses everywhere), one of whom, invariably a nosy little old lady who sits behind lace curtains who spies on everybody, will give all the pertinent info to the investigators. With that info, the police will go to the towing garage, charge the fellow there who moved the car with creating a public traffic obstruction (unless he fesses up to telling who paid for the towing bill), then return and charge Mr Windo with creating a public traffic obstruction AND lying to the police, a serious offence everywhere.

And, should it get before a judge, which it will, Mr Windo, if he does not say anything in his defence or to explain, can still be penalised for not doing so, if the judge infers guilt from the defendant's lack of candor. If the defendant gets before a jury (doubtful, unless he has priors) the judge can also instruct the jury to take Mr Windo's lack of testimony on his own behalf as possible evidence against him. Nice, eh?[%|]  

And you wonder why we have the Fifth Amendment?....[thinking]


As the Scots say in Glasgow, "Yer fooked, Jemmy..."[;D]  

Absolutely dumbfounding.

Remember Rule Britannia? "Britons never never will be slaves..."

Well, they are now. Isn't socialism and the nanny state, grand?

Ok, so pay the guy $50 to move it at 3:00am. Or better yet, move it to the chief of police's drive way.

Or drag it into the woods, and find a nice, deep mudhole to shove it into.

and leave a note saying: on the windshield.