Man avoids paying £7,000 Merseyrail fine by giving schoolfriend's details

A man has avoided paying thousands of pounds worth of fines by giving the details of a former schoolmate.

Liverpool Crown Court heard how James Francis Kelly, of Gorsedale Road in Wirral, gave out the name of an innocent man he previously attended school with.

Kelly's deception began almost four years ago back in October 2019 when he was issued with a fixed penalty notice for travelling without a ticket on a Merseyrail service.

Up until July 2022, Kelly continued to give out a name that was not his on 26 different occasions.

The 31-year-old did this repeatedly when he was handed fines for travelling without a ticket across trains in Merseyside.

The victim only became aware of the situation when a collection letter was sent to him demanding that he pay for the offences he had been found guilty of in his absence.

After an investigation by British Transport Police, officers uncovered the discrepancy and exposed the extensive fraud.

Kelly pleaded guilty to committing a series of acts with intent to pervert the course of public justice. He was also ordered to pay a victim surcharge of £149.

The 31-year old has been jailed for 10 months after his scam was revealed.

Investigating officer PC Marc Atkinson said: "This was a blatant attempt to shift the financial penalty of his own acts onto an innocent person, which, had it not been challenged and investigated would have caused the victim substantial financial loss."This was not a sophisticated scam by any means but Kelly's audacity meant that for three years he accumulated fines of up to £7,124.95 and passed them onto an innocent person."