In England, Spitting A Leaf Out of Your Mouth Gets You Fined

ENGLISH OCTOGENARIAN MAN FINED FOR SPITTING A LEAF OUT OF HIS MOUTH

It’s pretty challenging to have a good opinion of law enforcement and local authorities when things like this happen. Roy Marsh, an 86-year-old man who has a heart condition and severe asthma, found himself at ridiculous odds with enforcement officers and the East Lindsey District Council because a leaf blew into his mouth and he spit it out. He was enjoying a nice day and sitting next to a boating lake in Lincolnshire, England, when the wind blew a leaf into his mouth. Not surprisingly and totally naturally, he spat it out. But then two enforcement officers came up to him and said they saw him spitting on the ground.

FINED MAN HAS A HEART CONDITION AND SEVERE ASTHAM, SHOULD HE HAVE DIED INSTEAD?

Then Marsh, who is 86 years old, responded by telling the officer that he was a “silly boy.” Apparently that wasn’t respectful enough to an authority figure literally decades younger than he, and the officers then fined him $334.50 for “littering.” Why? Because he spat a leaf out that had blown into his mouth. Marsh appealed the fine, of course. But common sense and decency was still nowhere to be seen, and the fine was simply reduced to $200.70. Marsh paid the fine. His daughter Jane Marsh Fitzpatrick posted on Facebook how her father “has walking difficulties but does his best to walk every day around the boating lake” and that he “managed to cough up the leaf and spit it out. (Just the leaf).”

In England, Japanese Gardening Tools Get You Arrested

LOCAL AUTHORITIES LACK COMMON SENSE, COMMON DECENCY, AND ARE TONE DEAF AUTHORITARIANS

So an 86-year-old man who struggles just to breath managed to expel (by spitting) a leaf that flew into his mouth and was then fined by local authorities for…. littering? But it seems that there have been a lot of complaints about “overzealous” enforcement in the area of late. Yet the East Lindsey District Council has at least two deaf ears when it comes to listening to this obvious truth. Their response? That local enforcement officers have “not targeted any specific demographic,” and that they “only approach individuals who have been seen committing environmental crime offenses.” So next time I suppose the 86-year-old man should simply choke to death.

As I’m writing from the New World, I can’t help but note that a LOT of Puritans seem to enforce the law in England’s East Lindsey District.