:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():focal(557x292:559x294)/Roy-Marsh-121025-afe33e9e464c4da982e8ca6727eb7717.jpg?ssl=1 "Man Fined Over 0 for Littering Because He Spit Out Leaf That Blew in His Mouth")
NEED TO KNOW
- A man was fined hundreds of dollars because he spit out a leaf that blew into his mouth
- Roy Marsh, 86, ended up paying a lesser amount after the fee was later reduced on appeal
- “It was all unnecessary,” the elderly man said of the enforcement issue
An elderly man was fined for an unusual reason.
Roy Marsh, 86, was in Lincolnshire, England, earlier this year, when he spit out a leaf that blew into his mouth, leading to a fine.
“As I was sitting there, a gale blew a big reed into my mouth,” he recalled to the BBC, referring to the plant part of the grass family. “I spat it out, and just as I got up to walk away, two [enforcement officers] came up to me.”
Marsh told the outlet that one of the officers told him they saw him spitting on the floor, which led to the elderly man calling the local enforcer a “silly boy.”
“It was all unnecessary and all out of proportion,” Marsh said, per the BBC.
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Jane Marsh Fitzpatrick/Facebook
Marsh ended up receiving a fine of $334.50, though it was later reduced on appeal to $200.70. The man paid the latter.
Adrian Findley, a county councillor who works as a representative for Reform on Lincolnshire County Council, told the BBC he had received numerous similar complaints from others in the area.
“[Enforcement officers] are taking it too far. … There needs to be discretion about how they [enforcement officers] issue fines,” he told the outlet, adding, “If it looks like a genuine accident, then give people the opportunity to apologize and pick it up.”
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East Lindsey District Council (ELDC) told the BBC, however, that enforcement officers would “only approach individuals who have been seen committing environmental crime offenses.”
The organization added to the outlet that enforcement actions are closely watched and patrols were “not targeted at any specific demographic” and are “not discriminatory.”
In a Facebook post, Marsh’s daughter, Jane Marsh Fitzpatrick, recalled the incident.
“Dad, who has walking difficulties but does his best to walk every day around the boating lake, inhaled a small leaf that made him choke,” she wrote.
Fitzpatrick added, “Dad has severe asthma and a heart condition, [but] he managed to cough up the leaf and spit it out. (Just the leaf).”
