In Bath, in the November of the same year, Byers laid so many as thirty-four informations. The penalties to which the unfortunate coach-proprietors and others were liable in this prodigious batch were estimated at £500, but the newspaper reports of that time do not tell us the total of the fines actually inflicted, so we are unable to form any idea of the profits realised by the enterprising Byers in this Western raid. The petty and tyrannical nature of the prosecutions may be gathered from one instance before the Bathforum (for such was the style and title of the local bench) magistrates. A farmer was summoned for not having his Christian name and surname painted on the _right_ or off-side of his waggon, and mulcted in 10s. and costs, while another for the same mistake in the position was fined 5s. and costs; the magistrates, in addition, holding that the strict letter of the law required not only the name of the owner and that of the town, but the street as well.
A great sheaf of informations was laid by him at Brighton in July 1827. William Blunden, proprietor of a stage-van, was summoned--not for carrying more passengers than he should, but for not having painted on his conveyance the number of passengers his licence entitled him to carry. A £5 fine was the result, of which Byers was awarded 50s. and costs. In another of his cases on this occasion the informer did not come off victorious. It was not his master-mind that had prepared the cases, but that of one of his hirelings, Aaron Rolland, and there was a fatal flaw in this particular one. It was a summons against Snow, the Brighton proprietor, for carrying passengers in excess; but, unfortunately for the prosecution, the coach was not plying for hire on that occasion, and Byers suffered defeat.
In this same year Byers was arrested and imprisoned for debt, but he was soon out again and prosecuting with redoubled energy. In November William Cripps, of the firm of Cripps & Wilkins, coach-proprietors, appeared at his instance before the Brighton magistrates, charged with permitting a name other than that of the licensees to be painted on his coach. The name was that of the afterwards celebrated Henry Stevenson, of the “Age.” It was placed there with an idea of securing patronage for the coach, and it was contended in court, that forty names might so be painted on the panel of the coach, if the proprietors liked. But the bench held otherwise, and imposed two mitigated penalties of 50s. each with costs, it being the first offence.