The Sun.
London, England, 1859-02-23 00:00:00

THAMES.

TURNPIKE TOLLS IN THE COMMERCIAL-ROAD.—John
Sutton, jun., a cab-driver, of No. 11, white Horse-street,
Stepney, appeared before Mr. Yardley to answer two sum-
monses. The first charged him with refusing and neglect-
ing to pay to Frederick Horn, toll-collector at the Lime-
house gate, the sum of 3d. for passing through the gate
with his horse and cab on Thursday night last, and the
second summons charged the defendant with assaulting
and beating the complainant.
This prosecution was instituted by order of the Trustees
of the Commercial-road, to put an end to a fraudulent sys-
tem of evading payment of tolls which has been adopted by
many cabmen. The defendant passed through the Step-
ney gate on Thursday evening without a fare, and toll
was not demanded of him ; but he took up a
fare about one hundred yards eastward of the
gate and drove through the Limehouse-gate and called out
the letter printed on the turnpike tickets of the day. The
complainant believing that the defendant had already paid
toll at the Stepney-gate permitted him to pass, but soon
afterwards received a message from fames Campbell, the
collector at the Stepney-gate, that the defendant had not
paid the toll there. On the defendant's return to the Lime-
house-gate with his cab empty, the toll was demanded and
Sutton said he had paid toll in the morning and had no
right to pay it again. Horn insisted on the toll, and the
defendant cut at him with his whip, and struck him upon
the hand. A scuffle ensued and the cab driver attempted
to strike the complainant a second time with his whip.
Horn caught the handle of the whip and it was broken.
The defendant endeavoured to shuffle out of the case by
saying that empty cabs were always exempted from toll, and
that he had never paid toll unless he had a fare; upon
which it was explained that if toll was once paid on a cab
passing any of the gates with a fare, the toll was not de
mended a second time on the same day, unless the driver
had a fresh fare.
Mr. Yardley said the defendant ought to have paid the
toll when he passed the Limehouse gate with a fare, and
that he was bound to pay the toll every time ho passed
along the road with a fare.
The defendant—Must I pay the toll?
Mr. Yardley—Your fare must pay it.
The defendant then said that when he passed through
the Limehouse gate with his fare, the complainant was
drinking in a public-house.
The complainant gave a solemn denial to this statement,
anti Enid ho woe collecting the toll a few yards from the

gate from the driver of a London Parcels Delivery cart at
the time the defendant passed through the gate with a fare

in his cab. He was confirmed in every particular by George
Pearcy, the driver of the cart, who said he invariably pulled
up at the corner of Salmon's-lane, twenty yards from the
gate, to sort his parcels for the locality, and saw the cab
passing along behind an omnibus, and heard the defendant
call out the letter of the day.
Mr. Robert Scovey, foreman of the toll-collectors, said
that similar evasions by cabmen, who charged their fares
with the tolls, were frequent.

Mr. Yardley said the defendant had been guilty of a
fraud on the toll-collector, who was in the discharge of his
duty, though not actually at the gate when the cab passed
through with his fare, and the toll ought then to have been
paid. He must put a stop to these evasions, and the toll-.
collectors must be protected in the discharge of their
duties. He fined the defendant 10s. upon each summons
and the costs.
The money was paid.