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Penalty for injuring meters.
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38. Every person who wilfully, fraudulently, or by culpable negligence injures or suffers to be injured any pipes, meter, or fittings belonging to the Undertakers, or alters the index to any meter, or prevents any meter from duly registering the quantity of gas supplied, or fraudulently abstracts, consumes, or uses gas of the Undertakers, shall (without prejudice to any other right or remedy for the protection of the Undertakers or the punishment of the offender) for every such offence forfeit and pay to the Undertakers a sum not exceeding five pounds, and the Undertakers may in addition thereto recover the amount of any damage by them sustained; and in any case in which any person has wilfully or fraudulently injured or suffered to be injured any pipes, meter, or fittings belonging to the Undertakers, or altered the index to any meter, or prevented any meter from duly registering the quantity of gas supplied, the Undertakers may also, until the matter complained of has been remedied, but no longer, discontinue the supply of gas to the person so offending (notwithstanding any contract previously existing); and the existence of artificial means for causing such alteration or prevention, or for abstracting, consuming, or using gas of Undertakers, when such meter is under the custody or control of the consumer, shall be primâ facie evidence that such alteration, prevention, abstraction, or consumption, as the case may be, has been fraudulently, knowingly, and wilfully caused by the consumer using such meter.
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