Private land or public

[Dagger65]

I am wondering if someone could clear something up.
If a hotel/pub has been closed at 10am in the morning so the staff can go to a summer party and someone was caught driving in the car park at 8pm that same day and there are no residents or guests would this be classed a private land or still classed as public?

 

[Xeronema]

I thought I'd answer this, since no one else has.

My understand of this, if this is regarding a possible drink drive (or drunk in charge) conviction, it would still be classed as public. I vaguely recall, whilst on the drink/drive course that if an area is accessible to the public (even if there's a gate to stop cars from getting in), you would still be looking at a drink drive or drunk in charge conviction.

Now I could be wrong? It could be that the course provider (when I went on the DD course) just said that to make us be extra careful in future.

 

[C J 1980]

I am wondering if someone could clear something up.
If a hotel/pub has been closed at 10am in the morning so the staff can go to a summer party and someone was caught driving in the car park at 8pm that same day and there are no residents or guests would this be classed a private land or still classed as public?

If the car park is accessible to the public, then the offence is complete, regardless or it being privately owned or not. If however, the car park has a locked barrier or gate in place and is operated privately to guests/staff only then it probably wouldn’t meet the requirements of the full offence.

CJ

 

[Xeronema]

Well you answered it better than I could CJ. At least my memory hasn't completely faded lol. Cheers for clarifying what I thought was correct (just poorly worded on my part).

 

[BigTom]

If the car park is accessible to the public, then the offence is complete, regardless or it being privately owned or not. If however, the car park has a locked barrier or gate in place and is operated privately to guests/staff only then it probably wouldn’t meet the requirements of the full offence.

CJ

That's not the case CJ. Staff and customers are still members of the public, and there are reasons why other members of the public might enter the car park as car parks are, by design, public areas - so it would still be classed as a drink drive/in charge offence.

It might be different if the Police had to climb over a 6 foot fence into an industrial estate that was fenced off and the accused had permission from the land owner to be there.