A trial is underway at Southampton Magistrates’ Court this week for a man who is accused of several offences relating to the dumping of 50 hares and two raptors (a Barn Owl and a Kestrel) outside a community shop in Broughton, Hampshire, in March 2024.
James Kempster, 39, of Totton, Southampton, is charged with two counts of possessing a dead bird under the Wildlife and Countryside Act and a charge of criminal damage to the shop front.
The court heard that the alleged incident was caught on CCTV in the early hours of 15th March 2024.
Prosecutor Adam Cooper said: “This is a horror movie scene outside a Broughton village shop – it’s a small Hampshire village.
“In the middle of the night, at 3.23am, three men arrived outside the shop by car, the driver remains in the car, having manoeuvred it to a position so the boot is adjacent to the forecourt.
“Two men get out. They are both dressed in tracksuits, hoods up, balaclavas covering their faces so neither can be identified.
“They get out to discard the bodies of 50 dead hares over the forecourt, strewn about deliberately to maximise their coverage. The Crown says one of those two men is James Kempster.
Mr Cooper said one of the men then “tears or rips the body of one of the hares in half, blood is dripping on the floor, wipes the shop front, smearing the blood”.
He then takes two birds, a Barn owl and a Kestrel, from the car before wiping them in the blood and “stuffing” them under the door handles, the prosecutor said.
Mr Cooper added that the man “then beckons the car to show the driver their handiwork, gets into the car and leaves“.
The prosecutor told the court that DNA found on the dead birds was matched to Kemspter. He was also linked to the incident through his mobile phone location, his clothing and connections to the car, which was found burnt out in a country lane.
Kempster denies the charges and the trial continues.
This trial had been originally scheduled to take place in May 2025. For previous blogs on the case see here, here, here, here, here and here.
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