More Covid fines in last five weeks than in whole of last year
889 FIXED PENALTIES ISSUED
FRIENDS going for a McDonald’s, plane spotters, people watching a boxing match together and a man with Covid-19 going shopping are among those fined by the police in the past five weeks.
More fines for lockdown breaches were handed out last month by police in Leicestershire than in the whole of 2020.
In all, 889 fixed penalty notices were issued between New Year’s Day and February 2, totalling about £170,000. Last year, 850 were issued. Fines last month included:
■ A man who had tested positive for the virus who went to a shop and garage in Ibstock;
■ A man without a face mask at Tesco in Beaumont Leys;
■ Seven people watching a boxing match at a house in Syston;
■ A man stopped in Leicester who lived in Walsall but had driven to Leicester to visit family;
■ Four men from different households going to McDonald’s;
■ A Bradford man who could give no excuse why he was stopped in his car in Glenfrith Way, Leicester;
■ Five men at a party at Merlin Heights, a De Montfort University block in Bath Lane, Leicester;
■ A London man who had driven to Coalville to help his family with DIY work;
■ Four people from different households in a vehicle who told officers they just wanted “to hang out”;
■ Four people having a party at a house in Heritage Way, Leicester;
■ A group gathered at a skate park in Market Harborough, ignoring signs that the park was closed;
■ Four friends walking through the city centre at 2.40am going for food;
■ Four people from Kent in a car stopped in Blaby;
■ A Manchester man stopped in West Street in the city centre;
■ Several people with their cars in
Salisbury Road, Leicester, who told officers they were “chillin”;
■ A couple from West Bridgford who were “just watching planes” at East Midlands Airport.
Police bodycam footage shows the airport incident.
An officer confronts the rulebreakers, who have travelled 13 miles and who claim they are there to “watch planes”.
The officer tells them his wife – a health worker – has been crying for two weeks as she “cannot watch people die any more”. The officer issued two fixed penalty notices to them and told them: “Please pay attention to the guidelines – people are dying”.
Assistant Chief Constable Kerry Smith said: “We have had to step up our enforcement as the message was not getting through to the minority.
“In the past month we received 2,480 calls relating to the pandemic.
“This is double the amount of calls we were receiving before this current lockdown.”