A man described key player in a major dog-fighting scene has been sentenced to four months in jail and banned from keeping dogs for life. Barkat Hussain, 44, from Unett Street, Smethwick, West Midlands, trained pit-bull terriers for fighting and kept related medical supplies. He admitted keeping and training pit-bulls dogs in breach of a …
‘Killer’ badger diggers targeted
The RSPCA has said it will continue to gather evidence and prosecute men who dig out badgers and kill them. It follows the convictions last week of two men for badger digging and other offences. They will be sentenced next month by magistrates at Shrewsbury. An RSPCA inspector secretly filmed the men, from Lancashire and …
Two men found guilty of badger digging
Two men have been found guilty of badger digging* after they were caught in the act by an undercover RSPCA inspector. Gerard Monk and Paul Billington were filmed digging a badger sett in woodland at Sandford near Whitchurch on 11 May last year. They fled the scene after realising they had been watched. Both men …
Thousands of eggs are seized in raid as police swoop on collector
Police and bird conservation experts seized more than 5000 eggs in a raid on a home in a Scots village, it was revealed yesterday. Officers from Lothian and Borders Police and Tayside Police, along with representatives from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB), took the haul from a house in Torphichen, near …
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Magistrate offers to cull wild boar
MAGISTRATE Nick Negus has offered to help the Forestry Commission cull wild boar in the Forest of Dean. The keen hunter and parish councillor, who has spent decades travelling to the forests of Germany and Croatia to shoot boar, told the Forestry Commission he knew people who could do the job with the right weapons. …
Hunt supporter fined
Hunt supporter Benjamin James Elliot was ordered to pay £1,065 in fines and costs yesterday after magistrates watched 30 minutes of film footage showing him using his Land Rover to stop a hunt monitor's car travelling freely on a Dorset road. The prosecution told magistrates at Blandford that Elliot's manner of driving was "designed to …
Hunt master in court over assault claim
A hunt master from Durham will appear in court today after being charged with assaulting two female hunt monitors. LACS monitors Lynne Edwards and Hazel Greaves were monitoring the South Durham Hunt on 28 February 2009 when the attack by Gary Watchman is alleged to have taken place. Watchman will appear at Sedgefield Magistrates Court, …
Royal gamekeeper fined for snaring badger at Balmoral
A gamekeeper on the royal family's Highland estates at Balmoral has been fined after a badger was killed by one of his snares, breaching wildlife crime legislation. Robbie Elliot, 45, admitted he had failed to check a snare at least once a day at Birkhall, Prince Charles's Scottish holiday home at Balmoral which he inherited …
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Drug dealer with illegal dog escapes ban on owning pets
A CONVICTED drug dealer who admitted having an illegal American pit bull terrier has escaped a ban on keeping animals. Animal welfare officers and members of the public yesterday criticised the decision, particularly as the banned dog was found to have injuries consistent with being involved in fighting. Neighbours of Colin Boyle in the Borders …
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Welsh badger cull is brutal, futile and incomprehensible
Plans to cull badgers in Pembrokeshire will not work and amount to little more than a Welsh assembly effort to secure farmers' votes Badger cubs in the Westcountry The Welsh assembly has published a consultation document which would mean the total eradication of badgers from north Pembrokeshire, Wales. It would be stupid to deny that …
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