A partially blind 83-year-old pensioner who has never driven a vehicle has been convicted in a fast-track court of not taxing her late husband’s car while mourning his death.
The elderly woman was prosecuted by the DVLA over an unpaid bill on the VW Touran after it had been transferred into her name in April last year.
The pensioner told a court she does not understand the rules around car ownership, as her husband had dealt with all the bills throughout their 64-year marriage.
She said the vehicle was put in her name by her daughter’s partner, as a “good faith gesture” in the hope that it could be used in the future to take her to hospital appointments.
But she never used the car and it has now been scrapped.
Details of the case were aired in the controversial Single Justice Procedure, a fast-track court process used for low level criminal cases.
Magistrate Dr Stephanie Smith, sitting at Birmingham Magistrates’ Court, opted not to send the case back to the DVLA to check if her letter could lead to the charge being dropped.
The widow was convicted after sending in a guilty plea in writing, she was given an absolute discharge rather than a fine, but also now has a court order to settle £242.92 of unpaid tax by mid-September.
The Single Justice Procedure allows magistrates to sit in private to deal with cases, and is under scrutiny over the way sick pensioners are regularly convicted for failing to pay household bills.
The Ministry of Justice has said proposed reforms to the Single Justice Procedure will be set out “shortly”, while Mayor of London Sadiq Khan told the Press Association that every case of injustice that emerges damages public confidence and they “bring the courts into disrepute”.
The pensioner, from Reading, wrote in her letter: “My husband of 64 years passed away on 30th December 2024, at which time he was the registered keeper of the vehicle.
“Subsequently the vehicle was transferred to my name by my daughter’s partner in early April 2025, as the hope was that I may one day benefit from using the vehicle to go to hospital appointments etc.
“Although this gesture was in good faith, I did not really understand my responsibilities for the vehicle, as my late husband took care of such matters, all our married life.
“I do not drive and have several disabilities that cause me to be housebound (including being partially sighted) and therefore, never understood that I was the registered keeper, with the responsibilities this brings.”
She told the court a Statutory Off Road Notification (SORN) was applied for by her daughter’s partner, and she added: “I still have no idea what this means.”
She said the car was then spotted on the road when it had been taken for “evaluation/repair”, leading to the prosecution.
She added: “I am a disabled lady of 83 years old, who has never had a driving licence and therefore no understanding of the vehicle tax process.
“I was grieving my husband of 64 years, with very little awareness of the situation around me.”
The DVLA, which prosecutes thousands of motorists each week in the Single Justice Procedure, told a 2025 government consultation on proposed court reform that it believes prosecutors should automatically see all mitigation letters before cases go before a magistrate.
