Actor and scooter enthusiast Sir Idris Elba has been slapped with a fine for going more than 20mph on his moped.
Speed cameras clocked the actor, 53, making his way across Chelsea Embankment in central London at 10.12am on 21 June last year.
Sir Idris is renowned for his love of mopeds – so much it even made its way into a Taylor Swift song.
The US singer sampled the actor saying “We can go driving on my scooter – you know, just riding in London” on her 2019 song ‘London Boy’.
Meanwhile film fans will be reminded of Guy Ritchie’s 2008 film Rock’n’Rolla – where Sir Idris’s character has to evade Russian mobsters on a moped.
Sir Idris admitted riding the BMW moped but insisted he had not received a fixed penalty fine from the police and was denied a chance to pay it off before appearing in court.
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He was ultimately forced to pay a £147 fine and received three penalty points at Westminster Magistrates’ Court last Thursday. He was also ordered to pay £110 in costs and a £59 victim surcharge.
Police presented three images to the court, showing Sir Idris riding a scooter at 28mph in a 20mph zone.
The incident happened a day after it was announced the actor is collaborating with the King for a Netflix film about 50 years of Charles’s charity The King’s Trust.
But Sir Idris’s lawyers, Patterson Law, which specialises in motoring offences, urged the courts to let him ride off with just a £100 fine instead.
“Mr Elba initially responded to the Notice of Intended Prosecution to nominate himself as the driver and was expecting to receive a fixed penalty offer,” a letter read to the court said.
“However, the offer never arrived and he therefore never had the opportunity to accept it.
“Had he received it, he absolutely would have accepted it.”
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The law firm said the actor had a clean driving licence and was pleading guilty to the offence, sparing the expense of a trial.
“We would ask the court to consider replicating the fixed penalty by imposing no more than a £100 fine, with no award for costs,” the letter continues.
“He never received the fixed penalty – and this was through no fault of his own. It would therefore not be in the interests of justice to impose further financial penalties for something which was not his fault.”
The prosecution was dealt with in the Single Justice Procedure, meaning Elba was not required to attend.
