Can anyone advise, what are the procedures for reporting harrasment as a criminal offence?

-- David Keane (davidkeane@bushinternet.com), September 13, 2001

Answers

David,

Below is the response I got from a specialist. Please feel free to contact them directly yourself using the email address at the bottom. I would urge you to do this.

Regards

--> Dear Andy

Harassment of debtors

Administration of Justice Act 1970, s. 40 40.(1) A person commits an offence if, with the object of coercing another person to pay money claimed from the other as a debt due under a contract, he (a) harasses the other with demands for payment which, in respect of their frequency or the manner or occasion of making any such demand, or of any threat or publicity by which any demand is accompanied, are calculated to subject him or members of his family or household to alarm, distress or humiliation; (b) falsely represents, in relation to the money claimed, that criminal proceedings lie for failure to pay it; (c) falsely represents himself to be authorised in some official capacity to claim or enforce payment; or (d) utters a document falsely represented by him to have some official character or purporting to have some official character which he knows it has not. (2) A person may be guilty of an offence by virtue of subsection (1) (a) above if he concerts with others in the taking of such action as is described in that paragraph,notwithstanding that his own course of conduct does not by itself amount to harassment (3) Subsection (1)(a) above does not apply to anything done by a person which is reasonable (and otherwise permissible in law) for the purpose (a) of securing the discharge of an obligation due, or believed by him to be due, to himself or to persons for whom he acts, or protecting himself or them from future loss; or (b) of the enforcement of any liability by legal process. (4) A person guilty of an offence under this section shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine of not more than level 5 on the standard scale.

Repeated acts could also amount to an offence contrary to s2 protection from Harassment Act 1997

Behaviour of the type set out in s40 would also clearly justify an Injunction

Hope this answers the question

mail@harassment-law.co.uk

-- (andy.turner@ramesys.com), September 14, 2001.

YOU NEED TO HAVE A CONSULTATION WITH A LAWYER, THEY ARE EITHER FREE, OR CHARGE ABOUT $20.00, FOR CONSULTATION, BUT SHOP AROUND, THEY ALL WANT YOU TO BELIEVE THEY WILL DO THE BEST JOB, & MOST OF THEM ARE FULL OF SHIT! GO TO YOUR COUNTY COURTHOUSE, THE WOMEN IN THE LIBRARY OF LAW ARE MORE THAN WILLING TO HELP, SINCE THEY ARE BASICALLY BORED TO DEATH MOST OF THE DAY. GOOD LUCK! DIANE

-- Diane Marie Lawson (s1lver925@yahoo.com), April 22, 2004.