German student arrested for 'stealing' $0.01 of electricity

A student is facing legal charges for 'stealing electricity' worth less than $0.01 at a train station in Germany.

23-year-old Jan Michael Ihl plugged his laptop into a socket at an abandoned stand inside the train station. He was going to look up the address of a hostel in Kassel where he was staying at.

Jan Michael Ihl with his laptop at the train station

As he got out of the train station three police officers stopped and arrested him for "illegally extracting electricity".

The three police officers had been observing Jan Michael as he was crouching near the plug socket and said he was very nervous and constantly checking if anyone saw him doing 'it'.

It will later be decided by the public prosecutors if this case will ever come before a court. I wouldn't count on it.

Jan Michael, an energy specialist for environmental organisation Greenpeace later did his own calculations to find out how much electricity he 'stole'. He said: "The whole thing is ridiculous. I 'stole' electricity worth less than one cent."

Paul van der Maas	Wed, 25 Feb 2004 14:41:00 GMT

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