Earlier this week, Police Scotland issued a press statement about the conviction of two men in relation to a wildlife crime investigation on a pheasant and partridge shooting estate in Stewartry, Dumfries & Galloway.
David Excell, 54, pleaded guilty to trapping and killing a pine marten on the estate, in addition to failing to comply with the conditions of his firearms licence. He was fined £9,700 and his firearms licence has been revoked.
Kenneth McClune, 61, pleaded guilty to failing to comply with the conditions of his firearms licence. He was fined £840 and his firearms licence was also revoked.
At a superficial level this seems like a good result and a half-decent fine, at least for David Excell. The revocation of the firearms licences is also very welcome, although it would have been useful to know whether the two individuals also held shotgun certificates and whether those had also been revoked. (My understanding is that a shotgun certificate isn’t automatically revoked even if a firearms certificate has been – see here).
However, even though the convictions are welcome, there is something very odd about this case.
Firstly, the statement from Police Scotland was (deliberately?) vague, excluding the date the offences took place, the name of the estate where the offences took place and the occupations of the two guilty men. Is there some ‘shielding’ going on here?
Secondly, the police statement also included a gratuitous reference from the Police Wildlife Crime Officer in defence of shooting estates in general:
“The actions of a few individuals do not reflect the positive steps taken by most land owners and managers to maintain and encourage wildlife in our countryside“.
Eh? Why on earth is this statement included in a press release about a man convicted of wildlife crime, and perhaps more seriously, on what qualified evidence has this claim been based?
Some would argue that the intensive and systematic (currently lawful) killing of wildlife on sporting estates (up to an estimated quarter of a million animals per year on grouse moors alone), undertaken entirely on the basis of increasing gamebird stocks for shooting, is not ‘maintaining and encouraging wildlife in our countryside‘. Some species will benefit, for sure, but other species definitely don’t. Either way, this isn’t a pronouncement that should be coming from Police Scotland.
But the oddest thing of all about this case is that I believe it is linked to this 2021 Police Scotland investigation into the alleged killing of birds of prey on an unnamed estate in Stewartry, but there’s no mention of this in the Police Scotland statement.
So either (a) I’m wrong that the allegations of raptor persecution relate to this case and there’s another, entirely separate case relating to another Stewartry estate going on; or (b) the allegations about raptor persecution do relate to this case but are being heard separately (which would be odd but not inconceivable, especially if those allegations relate only to the two other men charged in October 2021); or (c) the allegations of raptor persecution do relate to this case but have been quietly dropped.
Some clarification is needed. Watch this space.
UPDATE 16 November 2023: Charges dropped for raptor persecution offences committed on Overlaggan Estate, Dumfries & Galloway (here)
Raptor Persecution UK 