On Sun, 25 Oct 2009 23:23:42 +0000, Roland Perry wrote:

It depends on whether travelling without a ticket is a civil or
criminal offence.

It's a criminal offence (modulo some exceptions where tickets weren't
available to buy at the station where you boarded).

I am still googeling for any reference to an arrest for having no valid
ticket while on the wrong train.

People will usually pay the penalty fare (or buy a new ticket), if they
aren't given a waiver. So you'd be looking for someone who failed to
pay. The worst you usually get in the press is those people moaning
about having to pay.

IIRC it's been stated (on Usenet...) that some ticket inspectors are
trained to interpret willingness to pay the penalty fare as evidence
of deliberate fare evasion, and therefore refuse to allow the
passenger to pay the penalty fare, instead insisting on prosecution.

This is because in many areas, ticket inspections are rare enough that
it'd be cheaper to pay the penalty fare on every inspection than to
buy a ticket for every journey.