A Leicestershire man has been convicted for the possession of protected wildlife that was discovered in his freezer during a joint police and trading standards raid in April 2023.
Kelvin Birtles of Saffron Road, Wigston, pleaded guilty to three offences – the possession of two dead badgers (in breach of the Protection of Badgers Act), the possession of two dead otters (in breach of the Wildlife & Countryside Act) and the possession of nine dead birds including three buzzards, four tawny owls, one barn owl and one swan.
The body parts of other animals were also found during the raid, including llamas, piglets, a pheasant and a horse, although as these are not protected species, their possession isn’t an offence.
Birtles had claimed all the animals were roadkill and that he hadn’t killed them himself. Even if that’s true, possession of protected species is still an offence.
District Judge Jonathan Straw ordered a probation report and deferred sentencing until 15th November.
Source: Leicestershire Live
UPDATE 30 December 2023: Leicestershire man receives 12 month community order for illegal possession of dead protected species, including 8 raptors (here)
Raptor Persecution UK 
So, llamas, piglets and horses are roadkill? Pull the other one
Roadkill? Highways Agency needs to be notified immediately – that’s a very dangerous area he lives in..
So should roadkill be left at the side of the road. Is it illegal for anyone to pick up a dead bird to have it stuffed? I’m not likely to do that, but plenty of other people are, particularly if it’s something unusual and therefore probably a protected species.
It’s an offence (WCA, 1(2)(a)) to have a live or dead bird (or any part of it) in your possession. There are a few defences, including if you can prove the bird was killed lawfully. I don’t know the details of the Leics case, e.g. whether post mortems were undertaken to show cause of death, but presumably, as Birtles has been convicted, he was unable to prove that the birds had not been killed (unlawfully).
Do you know if Birtles was a taxidermist?
I don’t know that, Doug, but given that the raid was jointly organised by the police and trading standards it would probably be fair to assume he had some link to a business that involves the handling of dead animals. Perhaps that will be revealed at the sentencing hearing.
What an utterly pathetic excuse, and a xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
What are the chances of finding two otters as roadkill?
Let’s hope he receives a custodial sentence and a heavy fine to try and deter other bozos from doing similarly
There are otters killed on the roads here all the time, unfortunate they can’t be collected.
Not sure about Leicestershire but both here in mid Wales and where I previously lived in North Yorkshire Otters as road kill were whilst not common were not that unusual either. The same is true of badgers and foxes, I’ve even seen Buzzards and the odd Kite here attracted by roadkill and then being victims themselves. There are ways of having these things legally, although I’ll not explain that here for obvious reasons.
Unfortunately, Otters are frequently killed on the roads, so I wouldn’t be too surprised if they were roadkill.
[Ed: comment deleted as libellous. Please note, he’s pleaded guilty to possession (of protected wildlife), not to killing it]
It would be interesting to hear the actual reasons as there are a good few of us who collect dead animals for various reasons, although collectors know we can’t hold animals like otters without a licence. The other animals are questionable unless they were unlawfully killed. I report any dead badgers I pick up (or don’t if they’re too damaged) to the badger folk. BOP I take pictures of before picking up, etc.
If Birtles is not a taxidermist this is a positively weird case especially the possession of dead llamas, piglets and a horse!