Milking the Meter

Abstract

During the year 1918 the Dutch dentist A.M.M. regularly fed his instruments with electric energy, supplied by the municipal electricity company, after having disconnected the electricity meter. In 1920 he was given a three month’s prison sentence for theft. The dentist appealed against this conviction to the Dutch Supreme Court. He argued that the lawcourt had violated art. 310 of the penal code, which states: “He who takes away any property that belongs completely or partly to someone else, with the purpose of appropriating it illegally, will, being guilty of theft, be punished with imprisonment for a maximum of four years [...]”. Obviously the text of this law dated from a time — 1881 — that no legislator had ever thought of the possibility of stealing something immaterial like energy. The dentist pleaded, firstly that electricity cannot be subsumed under “property”, because this word in its Dutch language context refers to tangible objects, and secondly that milking the electricity meter falls outside the meaning of “to take away”, which also refers to something tangible. The Supreme Court however rejected his arguments. It decided that milking the meter is similar to “take away” in its relevant respects; just as electricity is to “tangible property” (in contrast to either mental inventions like copyrights or other rights, that need specific protection laws) (Supreme Court, May 23rd 1921, N. J. [Dutch court reports] 1921, 564).