Quirky News
Good samaritan charged with littering
A US man has been charged with littering - after he tossed a couple of dollar bills to a beggar from his car.
John Davis was leaving a motorway in Cleveland, Ohio, when he saw the beggar in a wheelchair, reports Fox News.
He decided to try to help someone less fortunate than himself and grabbed a few dollars from his wallet.
"I have a brother that's paralysed," he said. "My brother's in that same situation and struggles."
As Mr Davis approached the man, he rolled up the money and stretched his arm out of his car window.
He says the man took the cash but one of the dollars fell to the ground. The man bent over and picked it up.
Moments later, Mr Davis was pulled over by a police officer who wrote him a ticket for littering.
He faces having to pay out up to $500 including costs and plans to challenge the ticket in court.
Cleveland police declined to comment but Mr Davis says it will make him think twice about helping those less fortunate in future.
"I'd like to do it again but I'm petrified I'm going to get a ticket," he said.
Update:
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what do you think?
andrew
Don't let the facts get in the way of common sense. Once he had explained what he was doing the policeman should have just turned round and got back in his car.
gordon
Entirely agree, but they seem to have a decent deterrent to dropping litter.
john
Pathetic!
dean bristow
like i have said before only in the usa
gby hly
cleveland police the salt of the earth !
Adrian Wagstaff
12:34pm on 24/5/2012
Aha! Interesting ... because ... it is clearly illegal, so far as I am aware to throw items from cars. I imagine that is also the case if the car is stationary. Also! You wouldn't want to actually throw coins at anyone begging incase the coins hit them? When one considers the facts up the screen there, we must consider throwing coins around a street is a bit littery. I suppose if the car was moving as he threw the coins, that is even worse 'cause then he's like firing missiles? I'm only reading the article, that's all I'm doing. That's how it reads to me.
John Rooney
3:48pm on 24/5/2012
For a start, it doesn't say he threw the money from the car. He reached out and handed the man the money and he dropped one of the notes. From that, I think it's safe to assume the car was stationary or moving at a crawl at most. Either way, it's typical of police to jump on something like that when there are far greater crimes going on under their noses that go unpunished.
Andrew Sumner
7:40pm on 25/5/2012
I think it was also dollar bills chap, which are notes.. dollar coins seem to be quite rare in USA.. There was a similar case in England where someone dropped a fiver and got a littering ticket.. got chucked out of court!