Posted on 09/16/2007 8:15:23 AM PDT by buccaneer81
Man Jailed Over 50-Cent Toll Mass. Resident Considering Lawsuit
POSTED: 6:49 am EDT September 14, 2007 UPDATED: 1:18 pm EDT September 15, 2007
ROCHESTER, N.H. -- A Massachusetts man who insists his New Hampshire highway tokens are still valid just spent three days in jail because he insisted on using two tokens to pay a 50-cent toll.
Thomas Jensen, 68, of Braintree, said the state broke a contract with him and everyone else who bought tokens by refusing to accept them after January of last year. He was convicted of theft of services for continuing to use tokens after they were phased out.
‘‘I gave the state of New Hampshire money for the tokens, and I expect to be able to use them,’’ Jensen told The Patriot Ledger.
Jensen was driving to his New Hampshire summer home when he tried to pay the 50-cent toll with tokens, as he had always done.
The toll worker refused to take them and a state trooper at the plaza gave Jensen a citation.
‘‘(The trooper) said, ‘Just give him the 50 cents.’ I said, ‘I did, I gave him two tokens,’’’ Jensen told the newspaper.
Monday, a judge told Jensen he could pay a $150 fine, do community service or go to jail for three days. He choose jail.
‘‘Over my dead body was I going to give the state another dollar for the tolls,’’ Jensen said.
He told the newspaper that the jail was a clean, new facility and that the food was better than expected. He said he spent his time in jail talking with other inmates.
Jensen never told his wife he was in jail. Beverly Jensen said she only found out when asked by a television news reporter.
After being set free Thursday, Jensen said he's considering a lawsuit. He said the state should just accept tokens until they're all used up.
‘‘I just get offended by people trying to do me wrong,’’ he said. ‘‘They stole the value of these tokens from me.’’
im on wifi on my laptop in Boston but google wikipedia MTA song. oddly enough, i’m visiting my son Charlie here and the pass on the public transportation system is the charlie card.
Geez, a man gets jailed for using a 50 cent token, illegal aliens violate laws everyday and are allowed to roam free.
It’s the state of New Hampshire that pulled a fast one here. What gives them the right to dishonor their end of the contract?
Look at it this way—why is it some people buy gift certificates as presents for others and if the recipient does not use them in a timely manner, the store/company in question charges fees or stipulates a time in which they must be used? Where’s your outrage there? This seems like a similar case.
"50 y/o NY subway tokens... And your analogy of the $10 gold piece is WAY, WAY off. Nice non-sequitur tho."
No. Also pre-Civil War stocks are good and must be honored.
Not if the stocks are worthless. BTW—a $10 gold piece has WAY more than $10 in gold at current market rates, and let’s not even go into the collectible issue (just ask OJ on the other thread).
They have expiration dates printed on each one. The courts generally don't back them and the States have passed explicit laws against them. The courts view it as a swindle. There was no expiration date given with the NJ tokens. It was made up when they pulled it out of their country club butts.
Oh look! NH bans expiration dates on gift certificates less than $100.
The stock is good as long as the Co. still exists.
"BTW—a $10 gold piece has WAY more than $10 in gold at current market rates,
The monitary value is $10. The value of the metal it's made from can be more, as in a penny. It's value otherwise is whatever someone will pay for it.
Perhaps you can represent the old fool at any future hearing. lol
I don’t think he’s an old fool. He’s just a “little guy” that got screwed by disreputable’s in govm’t that refuse to honor their obligations.
DOes the word honor mean anything to you. They jailed an old man over $0.5 for 3 days. First they took his money, then threw him in jail after they refused to honor their committment. Perspective my ass.
"I love how out-of-staters somehow know all about this case yet the local guy is somehow in the wrong."
Swindlers always hate it when folks expose their con. They always attack the person of one doing so, they're either outside agitators, or local malcontents.
"Unbelievable."
Nah, it's been going on since the beginning of time. Just the particulars of the con and enforcer change.
1) I admire this man for standing up for what he believes.
Or...
2) This man is stupid because he went to jail for such a petty thing.
Well we all know what you said — you called the man a fool — but we don’t know why you bothered to say it.
Do you care to tell us?
Don't need to.
I can't remember what I had for breakfast yesterday,
but I can remember every word to every song I listened to as a kid.
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