Unlicensed car clamper given two-year jail sentence

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Car Rental News - 31/05/2010

 

An unlicensed car clamper has been jailed for two years after exploiting large numbers of motorists.

A judge has sentenced an unlicensed car clamper to two years in prison after he deceived, threatened and defrauded large numbers of motorists into paying hundreds of pounds each to recover their vehicles. Many said they had witnessed their cars being clamped within minutes of having lawfully parked.

Twenty-eight year-old Andrew Baker ran his firm, Inter Park UK, in Birmingham, Wolverhampton and Walsall, and Milton Keynes. His company had contracts to operate at a small number of sites. Baker, however, appeared to run roughshod over the law, clamping and towing cars at sites where he had no authority, lying to motorists about his authority and seizing lawfully-parked vehicles. He admitted conspiring with others to make unwarranted demands from drivers.

The case began when trading standards officers received dozens of complaints in 2007 and 2008 from drivers alleging Inter Park UK had unfairly clamped their cars or towed them away. City officials investigating the complaints found evidence that Inter Park UK was operating on city land without any agreement. The judge described Inter Park UK’s operations as a “confidence fraud”.

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