A retired engineer has spent £30,000 in legal costs fighting a speeding fine of £100, the London Times reports.

Richard Keedwell (71), from Yate in Gloucestershire, asserts that he was wrongly captured driving at 35 miles per hour in a 30-miles-per-hour zone in November 2016 on a trip to Worcester.

He believed he had no case to answer and brought in video and electronic experts to say that the video capture machine was faulty or triggered by an adjacent car.

“Why should the authorities be allowed to get always with it,” he said.  “Why shouldn’t you challenge? It’s the thin end of the wedge.”

It took four trips to Worcester Magistrates Court before the case went to an appeal, which was lost at Worcester Crown Court in August.

Expenses

Keedwell said he had spent £21,000 on barristers, £7,000 in court costs and also had travel expenses. He remains adamant that he was wrongly accused.

“I’m 71. Why would I want to tailgate the car in front like a boy racer? I was just going around the block to the car park.”

Keedwell said that one of his three sons questioned why he was pursuing the case, and he responded that sometimes you have to stand up and be counted.

Tighten belts

He said the family would have to tighten their belts – he had initially expected costs of a couple of thousand pounds in fighting the case.

Keedwell added that he would keep on fighting as long as his lawyers believed there was merit in pursuing the matter.

Asked how he would advise others who believed they had been wrongly accused of speeding, he answered: “I would say, very bitterly, don’t bother.”