South Australian woman wins four-year court battle over $104 parking fine
A woman took the City of Playford to court to dispute her parking fine. File image. (ABC News: Malcolm Sutton)
In short:
A woman has won a four-year legal battle over a $104 parking fine issued by an Adelaide council.
The City of Playford has been ordered to pay 20 per cent of the woman's $52,896 appeal costs.
The council says it was defending a "fundamental point of law with far-reaching implications for South Australia's entire expiation system".
A South Australian woman has won a four-year legal battle against an Adelaide council after challenging a $104 parking fine.
According to court documents, a woman known as Ms Mathie was fined on Boucaut Avenue, Blakeview, adjacent to a private school in Adelaide's north in 2021.
Ms Mathie was fined for "double parking", with court documents stating her car was photographed twice over a two-minute period "stopped in a line of cars", but also immediately parallel to a line of parked cars.
Representing herself at Elizabeth Magistrates Court after she was fined, Ms Mathie argued she was stuck in a line of traffic, and could not drive onto the wrong side of the road.
The magistrate rejected her defence, finding that "two minutes is an exceedingly long time for a car to be stuck in traffic with no explanation and not move an inch".
Ms Mathie disputed the expiation notice in the Elizabeth Magistrates court in 2022. (ABC News: Tony Hill)
Speaking to ABC Radio Adelaide on Thursday, Ms Mathie's lawyer, Karen Stanley, said she assisted and took the case to the Supreme Court.
"I ran that argument that she had a defence and another very, very technical argument, and the Supreme Court said that we were successful on the technical argument," Ms Stanley said.
That technical argument was that the council's parking ticket was not clearly labelled, and referred to two separate offences under the Australian Road Rules and the Road Traffic Act 1961, meaning Ms Mathie was not told the specific allegations against her.
This argument later saw an intervention by the state's Attorney-General, Kyam Maher, who argued that the fine adequately described a "general description" of the offence.
But a Supreme Court judge found it was "incumbent upon a prosecuting authority to provide clear and precise particulars of the alleged offence".
The Supreme Court judge ruled that, with the allegations not communicated clearly to Ms Mathie, the council's six-month timeframe to prosecute her had expired.
Ms Stanley said the City of Playford then took the case to the Court of Appeal.
"Now, ultimately, the Court of Appeal overturned the technical issue, but really importantly, the Court of Appeals said, 'Well, actually, Ms Mathie had a really good defence and that was a defence that had never been told to her at [her original] trial.'
"[Ms Mathie] said, 'I would have been breaking other road rules by driving onto the wrong side of the road if I was to try and get out of that line of traffic,' and the Court of Appeals said, 'Yeah, you're right.'"
A City of Playford spokesperson says it was "important to uphold" the expiation system and "the legal principles that support it". (Supplied: City of Playford)
The case was ultimately sent back to the Magistrates Court for re-trial, but the council later withdrew its charge.
Ms Mathie applied for her appeal costs of $52,896 to be paid, however, the court ordered that the council pay 20 per cent of those costs, amounting to $10,580.
A City of Playford spokesperson said the council's involvement in the appeal proceedings was to "preserve the integrity of the expiation process, which is an essential regulatory function relied on by councils as well as the South Australia Police".
"This case was not about a single expiation, but a fundamental point of law with far-reaching implications for South Australia's entire expiation system," the spokesperson said.