An amateur mechanic who said he “likes a challenge” in fixing unrepairable cars was keeping 30 of them on the roads in his Brighton neighbourhood, a court heard.
Robin Mouland, 62, said it wasn’t fair when the council told him to move them from Selham Close and Selham Drive in Coldean, as they’d also told him he could no longer repair them on the street.
He said if he couldn’t fix them, he couldn’t move them – but magistrates today said that wasn’t a reasonable excuse as there were other ways of getting them removed.
And chair of the bench Robert Macrowan pointed out Mouland had discovered this to his expense in February when police towed 11 of them for being unroadworthy while on the public highway.
Mouland, of Selham Close, was in court for breaching a community protection notice Brighton and Hove City Council gave him in November 2024 which told him to stop using the green outside his house and public highway to store and repair cars.
Giving evidence, highways officer Jane Leach said the council had been receiving complaints about abandoned cars in his neighbourhood for at least as long as the 15 or so years she had been working in that department.
She said: “People would complain they couldn’t park there, that the street looked a mess, that cars were churning up the green.
“Cityclean also complained they were having access issues and the council couldn’t do annual inspections or street cleansing and overhanging trees couldn’t get cut back because the cars would never be moved.”
She said she did a full audit in March 2024, and counted more than 30 cars which appeared to be untaxed, unroadworthy or had no licence plates.
She and a colleague spoke to Mouland and went through the list of cars, and Mouland said 30 of them either belonged to him, or he was responsible for them.
In April, he was given an informal warning letter, but no cars were moved. Then in October, he was given an official CPN warning, followed by the actual CPN in November.
It gave him 28 days to move the cars from the neighbourhood, to stop doing repairs to any cars on the public highway, or to store any unroadworthy vehicles on roads in Brighton in Hove.
While some of the cars were moved, another audit in January found 16 of the vehicles were still on the roads there.
After the police removed 11 vehicles in February, two of the original list were still there – a black Mini and a grey Peugeot Boxer van. Meanwhile, three new cars which Ms Leach told the court she knew Mouland was responsible for have appeared.
Mouland, who represented himself, asked Ms Leach to prove he owned the 30 vehicles. She said her colleague had gone through a list of cars in February, and he had said he was responsible for 30 of them.
Giving his own evidence, Mouland said: “They’re discriminating against me, they’re victimising me, they’re persecuting me.
“I’m disabled. I buy these cars from a bloke around the corner, cars that mechanics can’t fix. I like a challenge. I have accumulated some vehicles.
“But at the time of 2024, 99 per cent of them were roadworthy and legal.
“I’m told I can employ the RAC or Kwikfit, but I’m not allowed to work on them myself.
“There are skips on the green. A rubbish collector has got his own parking space on the green, but he works for the council.
“I was going to get the chief executive put in prison for contempt for what the council did in 2005, confiscating my property. This was put in me in retaliation because I want the chief executive put in prison.
“My hands are tied. I couldn’t put a tyre on, I couldn’t jump start a car because I’m not allowed to work on them. How do I remove 30 vehicles without working on them?”
He added: “Would you have a problem if I parked 30 Rolls Royces there?”
He said after the police removed his cars, he’d been forced to pay hundreds in removal charges, storage charges and release fees – and that he was now being charged over backdated unpaid tax for those vehicles.
He also said it couldn’t have been the case some of the cars were without registrations in March 2024, because he had only removed the plates to avoid getting a parking fine when Brighton had played Southampton at the Amex in November that year.
He said he had appealed the CPN verbally over the phone – but admitted he had never followed this up in writing.
After retiring to consider the evidence, chair of the bench Robert Macrowan told Mouland they found him guilty.
He said: “In your evidence, you were very clear that the unroadworthy vehicles could not be removed because you could not work on them.
“As you know through the actions that the police took, there are other ways to remove unroadworthy vehicles.
“We do not find that was a reasonable excuse and we find that you have breached the order.”
Representing the council, Cassandra Bligh asked for £750 in court costs, and another £1760 to cover the costs of the investigation.
She also asked the bench to order Mouland to remove the remaining two vehicles from the original audit.
After hearing Mouland is on benefits, Mr Macrowan fined him £300, and reduced the costs to £300, with a surcharge of £120. He also gave him 28 days from today to remove the two vehicles.
Self centred clown, admits everything then pretends he didn’t, can’t drive them can’t fix them and still claims benefits while pretend working as a mechanic, not just the cars that need “fixing”
I think he got off exceptionally lucky there, reduced costs and everything. Glad the residents will have their green spaces back from this selfish individual.
Of cause he’s on benefits, he’s clearly suffering from an IQ deficiency