DEER HUNTS IN DANGER AS PAIR FOUND GUILTY OF FLUSHING OUT WITH DOGS

Steven Morris
The Guardian

The future of England's last three staghound packs was uncertain yesterday after two huntsmen became the first to be found guilty of illegally pursuing deer with dogs. Richard Down, a huntsman employed by the Quantock Staghounds, and Adrian Pillivant, a volunteer whipper-in, were convicted after a district judge ruled that they led the sort of old-fashioned chase that was outlawed under the Hunting Act, pursuing red deer in the Quantock hills in Somerset for almost three hours.

Down, 44, and lorry driver Pillivant, 36, argued that they were using the dogs to flush deer out to marksmen, which can be exempt under the act. They also claimed they were hunting to control the deer which compete with livestock for food. But the district judge, David Parsons, concluded that they were trying to preserve "a way of life that the participants and the defendants are not prepared to give up" and had attempted to "deceive me into believing they were exempt-hunting".
Animal rights campaigners, including the League Against Cruel Sports, which brought the private prosecution at Bristol magistrates court were jubilant.

The ruling could make life very difficult for the last three stag hunts in north Devon and Somerset. The hunts have taken extensive legal advice and believed they were working within the law.

Down and Pillivant, who are supported by the pro-hunting Countryside Alliance, may appeal but the three hunts will have a lot of thinking to do ahead of the start of the hunting season in the autumn.

The two men were caught hunting illegally in February last year. At least 17 riders, including children, followed the hunt, which had been called in by a landowner, Anthony Trollope-Bellew, to cull deer on his land near Taunton and move the herd on. As monitors from the campaign group watched, groups of deer were flushed out on three occasions and six animals shot. Four dogs were used, two at a time.

Down and Pillivant said what they did should be viewed as three separate events - deer were flushed and killed "as soon as possible" - and therefore legal.

But the judge disagreed. "This was a continual act of hunting over a period of two and three quarter hours ... some of the deer found at the first flush were present at the final flush ... the dogs may well have been deployed in relay to use fresh dogs to chase the deer faster and harder, to tire them quicker and to compensate for having to hunt with only two dogs."

The judge did not accept the animals had been shot as soon as possible and was unimpressed that the gunmen conceded that the deer could only be shot cleanly if they had stopped or slowed to a walking pace very close to them.

Outside court, Tim Bonner, spokesman for the Countryside Alliance, called the decision ludicrous and said it added "confusion to the whole picture".

Tom Yandle, chairman of the Masters of Deerhounds Association, said: "I'm very surprised by it. We will have to have a think about it but there are other exemptions we can use." Mr Trollope-Bellew, whose land the hunt began on, said: "This will make a lot of people very angry. It's going to mean more animals being shot by rifles and more injured rather than killed."

Mike Hobday, spokesman for the League Against Cruel Sports, said: "The chasing of wild animals is cruel, immoral and illegal. It is a way of life for some people, but it's against the law."

Down and Pillivant were each ordered to pay a £500 fine and £1,000 costs.

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