Dark Lord of the Sith had no train ticket
Tuesday 25th January 2011, 11:00PM GMT.
Star Wars’ Darth Vader is more at home on the Death Star, or attacking the Rebel Alliance in his TIE Fighter.
The last place you would expect to find him is on a train in the West Midlands.
But in keeping with his nefarious ways, the evil right-hand-man of the Galactic Emperor failed to pay his fare.
On a recent journey on the London Midland line, Vader was caught without a ticket and prosecuted.
And now he has been named and shamed at Telford Central station which is displaying a list of people fined for fare-dodging.
Vader, who is apparently 41 and lives in Miner Street, Walsall, is listed with hundreds of passengers successfully prosecuted by London Midland.
The name and shame poster reads “evading your fare is against the law and we’re cracking down on offenders.
“Our dedicated revenue protection team – often in plain clothes – are trained to find those who have deliberately avoided paying.
“As well as a fine of up to £1,000, do you really want your friends, family, and employers seeing your name on this poster?”
Mrs Premila Pencholi, of Bricharls News and Convenience Store, near to the home Vader shares with his wife Sue, said he was believed to have changed his name for charity.
“He’s a gentle soul really, he’s quite a nice chap,” she added. “They come in once or twice a week. It’s quite funny to have the leader of the Galactic Empire living around the corner.”
London Midland operates trains in the heart of England, connecting London, the Midlands and the North West.
Spokeswoman Karen Blanchett said: “Rules are in place for everyone to abide by and those who fail to do so run the risk of being prosecuted.”
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He could never ever ever become a peadiatric nurse now. Shame really, I’m sure the children would love a carer with that name.
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Classic…
“He’s a gentle soul really, he’s quite a nice chap,” she added. “They come in once or twice a week. It’s quite funny to have the leader of the Galactic Empire living around the corner.”
That quote had me in stitches.
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I like the way that talking about how lovely this chap is seems to have trivialised his crime.
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I’m pleased to see you wrote “TIE fighter” and not “tie fighter” :-)
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Yes, great stuff and good to see an attention to detail in the media for once on this sort of thing :)
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What are the Sith, exactly?
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They’re the ones that come immediately before the Seventh. I think.
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If my memory of C-grade Star Wars canon serves me correctly, the Sith were a race of humanoids that were indigenous to a planet that was later settled on by outcast (dark) Jedi.
Over many millennia, the two peoples became one, and the Sith adopted the traditions and hereditary force sensitivity of the dark Jedi.
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Thanks for that. And what about this rumour that Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker are related in some way?
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I bet his death star broke down in Cannock again. Always happening.
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I say “fair play” to him and all the others for not paying his fare… the rail companies are a bunch of thieves themselves… the amount they charge for such a sub-standard service is insane.
Travelling by rail should be a relaxing and pleasant experience, compared to driving at least, but with all the overcrowding, delays, unsanitary toilet facilities, poor and over-priced food, it’s a real pain. All this is bad enough, but when you factor in the rail companies’ palpable hostility towards their customers, I don’t understand why anyone uses the train except when they have absolutley no other choice! The staff are rude and unhelpful and give every appearance of resenting your presence on their trains or in their stations… if any other public sector treated its customers with such disdain, they wouldn’t last a year but the rail companies hold all the cards and obviously don’t feel obliged to provide a decent service.
Rant over!
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