A MISTAKEN identity error by Bolton Magistrates Court has been blamed for plunging an innocent dad-of-four into a Kafkaesque series of court appearances over an unpaid train ticket.

Lee Wainwright says he was 250 miles away in Essex when someone at Manchester Piccadilly station gave his details to inspectors after getting stopped without a ticket.

Now Northern Rail and the courts service are blaming each other for the mistake.

The first thing the 39-year-old knew about his alleged illegal train ride on February 20, 2013, was when Greater Manchester Central Accounts and Enforcement Unit tried to take £322 out of his wages last month, acting on information provided by prosecuting body, Northern Rail.

“I received an email from my employers, Odema Ltd, saying they’d been contacted by the court and had to take a percentage off my wages because of an unpaid fine,” said Mr Wainwright, of Kenyon Avenue, Sale.

“Apparently, I’d been caught at Manchester Piccadilly without a valid train ticket, but I haven’t been on a train for 25 years. I don’t use public transport.”

Mr Wainwright, an on-call data engineer whose job takes him all over the UK at short notice, has timesheets indicating that he was working on a computer system at McDonald's in Colchester on the day of the offence.

Furthermore, the fine had somehow found its way to Lee despite the fare dodger initially giving an address in Bredbury — somewhere Lee has never lived — and which was somehow linked to him via another Sale address he hasn’t lived in since he was 15.

“I explained it wasn’t me. I can’t understand why the first time I heard about it was when they were about to take it out of my wages. It’s like they haven’t made the effort to find me.

“If they can contact my work, then why didn’t they ask my employers for my correct address?

“I’ve lived here for nine years. I’m on the electoral register."

Mr Wainwright found himself at Trafford Magistrates Court having to obtain a statutory declaration, blocking the money from being removed from his account and getting the original hearing re-listed at Bolton Magistrates Court.

He has already had to take two days off work to deal with the situation.

“This really has stressed me out a lot. Now it’s down to me to prove my innocence. I didn’t think the British justice system was supposed to work like that,” he said.

An HM Courts and Tribunals Service spokesman said it is the prosecutor who provides information to the court on the identity and address of the defendant.

He added: “Following a statutory declaration made by Mr Wainwright, the case has been relisted for June 1 2015 at Bolton Magistrates Court."

However, a spokesman for Northern Rail has now said they won’t be pursuing a case against Lee.

“The fact that the case has been linked to Lee Wainwright through an old address is nothing to do with Northern Rail,” a spokesman said.

“We simply took the name and address of the individual on the day and attempted to contact them after the event to reclaim the fare they had not paid for into Manchester.

“Due to the information we have, we will not be pursuing the case against Mr Wainwright but the link to an old address and therefore ‘mistaken identity’ was down to Bolton Magistrates Court, not ourselves.”