This week’s blog post concerns the unlawful arrest of one of my clients for what can only be described as a non-crime; and the action I took to win compensation for him. My client’s ordeal was recently reported upon by the Daily Mail, and I can here provide some further detail and commentary.
One afternoon in November 2022, my client (who goes by the YouTube name “Eye Spy Audit”- ESA in this blog post) filled up his car with £20.10 worth of diesel at a BP Fuel Petrol Station in Stockton-on-Tees and offered payment by way of a £20 coin and 10 pence coin to the cashier.
A £20 coin is legal tender in accordance with the Coinage Act 1971.
ESA was wearing a face mask, as had become common during the Covid pandemic. The manager of the petrol station refused to accept the £20 coin as payment unless (-this was a bizarre stipulation-) ESA removed his facial mask. This was despite the fact that there was no notice or advertisement on the fuel pumps warning potential customers that certain denominations of otherwise legal tender would not be accepted in payment of the goods being offered for sale (in this case, diesel).
ESA refused to remove his mask, rightly considering this to be irrelevant to the issue of whether or not the petrol station should accept his method of payment.
The manager of the petrol station then telephoned Cleveland Police and two officers, PC Gates and PC Rose, attended at the scene and spoke to Isaac, who was waiting patiently in the station shop.
ESA politely explained the situation to both Officers. The manager passed to PC Gates the £20 coin and ESA explained that the coin was legal tender (although being under no obligation to explain the law to a Police Officer).
PC Gates refused to accept that Isaac’s £20 coin was legal tender and threatened him with arrest for “bilking” i.e. making off without payment – unless he agreed to provide his name and contact number. Isaac refused this unlawful demand.
Nevertheless, PC Gates in fact did then establish ESA’s name, by carrying out a vehicle check on ESA’s car. PC Rose then read ESA’s name out loud in front of the petrol station manager and other customers.
Shortly thereafter, PC Gates placed ESA under arrest on suspicion of “making off without payment”, despite the fact that ESA was continuing to offer payment in entirely legal tender and was very much ‘remaining put’.
The Officers escorted ESA outside the shop. He was obliged to remove his hat, face mask and jacket and was then searched. His car keys were also confiscated.
ESA was then required to get into the rear of a Police van and was transported to Middlesborough Police Station by PC Gates.
Upon arrival at the station, ESA was advised that there was a queue of people to be processed. ESA was obliged to wait in the van, where he noticed blood smears in all the seating locations on both sides and on the ceiling. When ESA made reference to these blood smears, PC Gates was dismissive of his concerns.
As the delay continued, ESA began to experience neck and back problems. He suffered uncomfortable stabbing pains in his legs, back and neck and arms. However, PC Gates refused his reasonable request to be allowed to get out of the van and stretch his limbs.
In the circumstances, ESA then asked to see the nurse. PC Gates briefly left the van and then, on her return, derisorily informed Isaac that the nurse had apparently refused to see him unless he “wasn’t breathing” or was “dying”.
After what felt like an hour, ESA was finally allowed to exit the van and was taken into the police station where he was then held in a holding area for approximately 40 minutes.
Eventually, ESA was produced before the Custody Sergeant.
The Custody Record gives the circumstances of ESA’s arrest as follows;
“Police have been called to a PFS whereby the DP has fuelled his vehicle and attempted to pay with coins which have been confirmed to be non-legal tender. The Garage as such would not accept them. The DP would not provide officers with details at the scene.”
The assertion that Isaac’s £20 coin (presumably the Officer wasn’t referring to his 10 pence piece, although who knows…) was ‘non legal tender’ was highly misleading. The coin certainly was legal tender and nobody had ‘confirmed’ otherwise.
Indeed, having been told of the arrest circumstances, the Custody Sergeant pulled PC Gates to one side, and when he returned, advised ESA that his detention was not authorised and he was to be released.
The Custody Record states that –
“Detention (was) not authorised – the DP was presented as a make off without payment. The DP has not made off from the scene and has awaited police attendance. As such this offence was not made out. The DP has also made no attempt to leave, so the offence of attempt make off is not made out either. The officer advised she arrested the DP because she was advised to by her supervisor, but she advised me she agreed there were no grounds to detain the DP, other than to identify his name/address. The DP provided me with those details in any event. I explained to the officer that in order to arrest to establish a name/address, there also needs to be a substantive offence to investigate – as per earlier there is no offence made out. The officer was satisfied that there were no further grounds to detain the DP, and intends to deal with the issue as a civil matter.”
Having been detained for the best part of 3 hours, ESA was now de-arrested and driven back to the petrol station where his car was parked. All of his possessions were returned except for the £20 coin which was retained by the Police for a further 2 weeks, for inexplicable reasons.
Regular readers of this blog may recall a very similar incident to this which occurred to my client Brett Chamberlain at the hands of Devon and Cornwall Police.
This latest incident is sadly further evidence that Police failure to understand basic concepts of law concerning payment for goods and services remains widespread, resulting in civil liberties violations and a massive waste of time and resources by Officers who show far too much deference to the agents of big business rather than the rights of private citizens behaving in a perfectly lawful manner.
In many respects this was the opposite of a shop lifting incident – a store manager refusing to accept legitimate payment for goods and calling the Police who responded with an “arrest first, think later” approach.
In response to the claim which I advanced on ESA’s behalf, Cleveland Police adopted an equally typical “deny first, think about it later” approach. Refusing the opportunity to admit liability or apologise to ESA, they gave us no choice but to commence civil court proceedings.
The Police then filed a full-blown Defence, disputing ESA’s claim on the grounds that the BP petrol station was entitled to refuse ESA’s chosen method of payment; this is simply not the case if the proffered method of payment is legal tender and customers have not been given prior notice by the business (in this case the petrol station) that there were forms of legal tender they would not accept, before irrevocably taking the goods (in this case by filling their vehicle from a self-service fuel pump).
I ultimately settled ESA’s court claim against Cleveland Police for damages in the sum of £3,999 (plus his legal costs).
A £20 coin is a legal tender of the realm, but here the Police Officers involved seem to forget their oath to uphold the laws of the land and instead acted as if they were bouncers for BP Fuel Stations.
Hopefully my client’s action will remind the Police where their true duty lies.
Watch ESA’s YouTube video about this here and his t.v. interview here.
The names of my client and the officers involved have been changed.
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