Case dropped against foreign satellite pub

Related tags Media protection services Foreign satellite football Premier league

A satellite
A satellite
A Coventry licensee has avoided prosecution for showing foreign satellite football after Media Protection Services offered no evidence against him....

A Coventry licensee has avoided prosecution for showing foreign satellite football after Media Protection Services offered no evidence against him.

Christopher Hatch of the Mount Pleasant Inn in Bedworth, was due to appear in court last week but the prosecution was dropped.

MPS had initially served Hatch with a summons on February 15 after investigators found him showing football via the Arabic ART channel.

However, on Thursday 30th November, MPS, the prosecuting and investigating body for the FA Premier League, offered no evidence in court.

This is one of the older cases where we have had difficulty in proving the dishonesty aspect ​ Ray Hoskins of MPS

According to Hatch's solicitor Stuart Sutton, MPS told the magistrates that the reason for dropping the case was that they had only recently received a statement from Hatch saying he had never received his "Legal Advice Letter" and "Legal Notice" from MPS.

But Sutton dismissed this.

He said: "You can imagine what the response would have been at an earlier stage if we had written to MPS, saying 'Mr Hatch says he never received your warning letters, so would you drop the case please?'"

Ray Hoskins of MPS told morningadvertiser.co.uk: "This is one of the older cases where we have had difficulty in proving the dishonesty aspect. We have now taken steps to negate that defence by producing a letter from ART which says they have no rights to broadcast football in the UK."

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