4,000 lockdown fines are dropped by Met

About 4,000 Covid fines handed out by the Metropolitan police during the pandemic were abandoned before cases were brought to court. The Met used the emergency laws more than any other force in the past two years, issuing over 16,500 fixed penalty notices to Londoners suspected of attending illegal gatherings, breaking lockdown rules, not wearing a mask or ignoring the need to self-isolate. Scotland Yard said 56 per cent of the fines were paid up front, leaving several thousand people at risk of criminal prosecution.