At 8.55pm on Tuesday, August 28, two Police Community Support Officers spotted Dr. Ibrahim Almeriy on Wood Lane in Horsforth taking a car boot load of cardboard out of his BMW car and throwing it to the ground.

Wood Lane is a quiet dead end road, and the event occurred well into the evening.

A Leeds City Council Environmental Enforcement Officer interviewed Dr. Almeriy, who claimed that he was collecting cardboard to line the boot of his car, and the two Police Community Support Officers were mistaken in their evidence.

The court heard that Dr. Almeriy, Broadgate Walk, Horsforth, maintained that he was standing at the boot of his car on a country lane for no other reason but to collect cardboard from the side of the road to line the boot of his car. He claimed that having collected it, it was too dirty, so he threw it back onto the ground.

Leeds Magistrates heard Mr. Derek Hallam, for Leeds City Council, explain that that once somebody picks up waste and therefore takes control of it, they become responsible for it and that if that waste is then thrown away, the offence of flytipping takes place.

This was accepted by the court and Dr. Almeiry, an unemployed medical practitioner, was given a conditional discharge for 12 months and ordered to pay £728.64 costs.

The depositing of waste on land is an offence under section 33 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990.

Councillor Steve Smith, executive board member for environmental services, said: "Whatever the excuse, such dumping not only damages the environment, but affects the amenity of the local area.

"The cost to remove such waste amounts to hundreds of thousands of pounds each year and these costs must be borne by Leeds City Council and the taxpayers of Leeds."