Tampering with lorries: a legal vim
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by CM's legal correspondent
If the militant Young Liberals were to go ahead with their recent threat to let down tyres of heavy lorries, as a protest against their continued use in certain areas, this would pose some interesting legal questions. It is suggested that it will not be possible to prosecute anyone doing this for any offence but this, I feel sure, is not the case. This sort of conduct is normally dealt with under Section 1 of the Criminal Damage Act 1971, which makes it an offence for any person, without lawful excuse, to destroy or damage any property belonging to another person.
One of the difficulties, where deflated tyres are concerned, in proving this charge, is establishing "damage". When tyres are deflated by removing the valve core, the tyre itself is not "damaged in the accepted sense of the word because when the tyre is re-inflated it returns to its original condition. I feel, nevertheless, that a charge might be successful under this section particularly because of a very old stated case; R v Fisher (1895) LR 1 CC 7, where it was held that the damage need not be of a permanent nature.
More recently, in 1948, in King v Lees (65 TLR 21) it was held that urinating in a taxicab, thus causing it to be out of service for a few hours while it dried out, but doing no permanent damage, is "injury", so letting the air out of tyres could be held to be causing damage.
Another snag to this charge is that the damage must be caused without "lawful excuse" if a prosecution is to be successful. Section 5 of the Act states that a person shall be treated as having a lawful excuse if he damages property in order to protect property belonging to himself or another person and at the time of the act alleged to constitute the offence he believed:— (i) that the property was in immediate need of protection; and (ii) that the means of protection adopted were reasonable having regard to all the circumstances.
For the purposes of this section the Act states it is immaterial whether a belief is justified providing it is honestly held.
One can see this defence being brought forward, the accused pleading that he genuinely thought that the lorry on which he let the tyres down was causing damage to some. ancient historical building as the vehicle went on its normal everyday journeys. Whether or not a court will accept this evidence remains to be seen. On indictment a person found guilty of this offence is liable to imprisonment for a period of up to 10 years,
An alternative to a charge under the Criminal Damage Act is Section 29 of the Road Traffic Act 1972 which reads:— "If, while a motor vehicle is on a road or on a parking place provided by a local authority, a person otherwise than with lawful authority or reasonable cause gets on to the vehicle or tampers with the brake or other part of its mechanism, he shall be guilty of an offence." I have some doubt as to whether tyres could be construed as forming part of the mechanism of a lorry but a dictionary defines "mechanism" as "structure, system of mutually adapted parts working together" and this would seem to include the tyres on a vehicle.
A policeman friend of mine is quite certain that tyres are included in the mechanism of a vehicle and if this is so then this charge seems very appropriate for the circumstances under discussion. The maximum penalty under this Section is three months' imprisonment or a £50 fine.
As a last recourse, anyone letting down lorry tyres could be charged with the common law offence of "conduct likely to cause a breach of the peace". This is the charge used when a "peeping torn" is caught looking into a bedroom window in the hope of seeing a woman undressing or where a pervert is found spying on courting couples.
The theory behind this charge is that if the offender was caught by some person other than a policeman the offender might get a good hiding from the man who found him and a breach of the peace would be occasioned. This charge could be preferred against any person who lets down the tyres on a lorry. I can just imagine an irate lorry driver setting about some young student type who has interfered with his lorry.
Lorry drivers, of course, must not take the law into their own hands in this way; they would be charged with assault if they did but this does not prevent the breach of the peace charge being preferred against the person who lets down the tyres, Unfortunately, a person charged in this way can only be bound over to keep the peace. He cannot be fined or sent to prison. If he is bound over he will be required to enter into a recognizance, that is he will have to acknowledge that he owes the Crown a certain sum of money, if he does not keep the peace for some time in the future. In other words if he goes out and again lets down the tyres on a vehicle he can be brought back before the court and he will then have to pay the sum of money as he agreed at the previous court appearance.
Although this sounds a cumbersome procedure it works extremely well and it may be appropriate to group the "letter down of tyres" with the "peeping toms".