NEWS | Electrician sentenced to a 12 month community order and ordered to pay fines for fly tipping and other waste disposal offences.
A Hereford electrician has been fined for illegally disposing of waste in a case taken to Hereford Magistrates’ Court by Herefordshire Council’s Community Protection Team.
Mr James Dennis Smith (26) of The Bines, Clehonger was sentenced on Wednesday 24 April 2019 after pleading guilty to three charges in total; one charge of fly tipping, one charge for not being a licenced waste carrier and one charge for failing in his duty of care to transfer waste legally to an authorised person on a previous occasion. He was sentenced to a 12 month community order, 150 hours reduced to 100 hours of unpaid work, a fine of £680 and ordered to pay costs of £635.84 plus a £30 victim surcharge.
At the hearing on Tuesday 2 April, the court heard that Mr Smith responded to a Facebook request to remove what transpired to be three van loads full of house renovation waste, mainly bricks. He was paid £300 to remove the waste from the Hereford home in September 2018. A Madley landowner subsequently found the waste fly tipped in their field a few days later.
Further investigations revealed that Mr Smith had transported the waste without a waste carriers licence and that he did not have any duty of care records to show where the waste was collected from and taken to for the previous two years.
The maximum penalty for fly tipping is a £50,000 fine and/ or 5 years imprisonment.
The Community Protection Team will investigate fly tipping cases that are reported via the Herefordshire Council website or by calling 01432 261761.
For further information visit www.herefordshire.gov.uk/flytipping
