Notorious car clamper facing Asbo

Due in court for immobilisation

By Lester Haines • Get more from this author

Posted in Crime, 25th May 2007 15:00 GMT

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An employee of a car-clamping outfit which has "brought misery to visitors to a Yorkshire tourist village" looks likely to be immobilised himself - by an Asbo.

According to the Yorkshire Post, George Albert McDicken, 38, of Wilsden, near Bradford, is due in Leeds magistrates court today accused of "intimidating and aggressive behaviour" following "hundreds of complaints to police and Bradford Council" regarding his demeanour in two car parks in Haworth.

McDicken works for Carstoppers, once honoured with a Dick Turpin award "for being the modern day equivalent of a highway robber". Its legendary exploits include, the BBC notes, clamping a motor while the driver was asleep inside; requiring a heavily-pregnant woman "to walk two miles to the nearest cash machine to get money to pay the firm"; and "showing no mercy" to a wheelchair-bound visitor to Haworth who with her husband "arrived late at their car after struggling to walk up the steep hill" to the village centre.

A Bradford Council spokesman said: "The Asbo application has been brought following numerous complaints to the police and ourselves over a long period of time. The case is not actually against clamping, which is legal, it is the behaviour that goes with it." ®

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