Tag: gamekeeper

Head gamekeeper jailed for cannabis factory on sporting estate but not charged for poisoned buzzard

In April 2010, we reported on the conviction of 26 year old gamekeeper Ben Walker, who was found guilty of 17 offences relating to the killing of protected species with poisonous baits on the Sufton Estate in Herefordshire in late 2009 (report here). During the police investigation into the alleged criminal activities on this sporting estate, it is reported that a poisoned buzzard was found in an outbuilding used by his boss, head gamekeeper Mark Rigby. As usual, it was not possible to ascertain who was responsible for the death of this bird – even though it might appear obvious. There are no reports of either keeper being charged for possession of the poisoned bird. However, a search of an adjacent outbuilding uncovered what has been described as ‘a large cannabis cultivation operation’. It seems it was not so difficult to establish the identity of the guilty party in this instance, because, according to the RSPB, at Worcester Crown Court on 24 November 2010 head gamekeeper Mark Rigby pleaded guilty to four counts of producing and possessing a Class B drug with intent to sell and he was imprisoned for two years.

The conviction of Rigby is reported in the latest issue of Legal Eagle, the RSPB’s investigations newsletter, here.

Fund-raising sky dive by OneKind investigator – please support him!

We have received the following message from a member of the  investigations team at the Scottish charity OneKind. You may recall OneKind was instrumental in catching criminal gamekeeper Lewis Whitham placing a poisoned bait on Leadhills Estate last year. ‘Steve’ is undertaking a charity sky dive at the end of August to raise funds for field equipment and also to raise awareness about the on-going illegal raptor persecution in this country. Please support him!

“Hi, Thank you for this valuable site. Nothing compares to it on the web and is a reminder, if ever some of us need it, to the true and serious problem that we have in Scotland as to the persecution of birds of prey. My investigations and research over recent years has lead me to areas of Scotland where I have not only come across poisoned and shot raptors, but I have even witnessed a gamekeeper setting out carbofurin onto a rabbit in an area where raptors fly.

At every opportunity we must remind the general public that reports of incidents involving raptor persecution are only the tip of the iceburg. Crimes against birds of prey are almost always carried out in isolated areas where the public rarely walk and it is often only chance that these poisoned or shot birds are discovered. For every raptor I hear killed then I times that by ten for those that the perpetrator of these serious crimes takes away, burns, buries or are lost amongst the heather or within the woodlands.

At the end of August I am doing a fund raising skydive to raise funds for the investigations department at the Edinburgh animal charity OneKind and also to highlight the serious problems that we have in Scotland of raptor persecution. Please could I use this opportunity to give you the link to my skydive fund raising page. Anything that people could donate would go directly to obtain equipment to help me keep one step ahead of those that I investigate. Many thanks“.

Please sponsor ‘Steve’ here and read about the equipment he hopes your sponsorship money will buy.

More on convicted Derbyshire gamekeeper Glenn Brown’s case

It was good to see so much media coverage following the conviction of criminal gamekeeper Glenn Brown on Monday. It made local, regional, national and international news, probably because he committed his crimes on National Trust property – which isn’t somewhere you’d normally expect to hear about wildlife crime taking place. Let’s hope that the National Trust are reviewing the lease of their land to the ‘un-named third party’ as we speak.

Despite the broad media coverage, very few articles mentioned the dead sparrowhawk that was found close to one of the traps that criminal gamekeeper Glenn Brown was operating.  Also found close by was the body of a white pigeon. Mark Thomas, one of the RSPB investigators involved with catching Brown at it, has written an excellent little piece about the investigation here, alluding to what might have happened to the dead sparrowhawk and dead pigeon.

Thomas also writes that since 2006, goshawk and peregrine productivity in the Derwent Valley has collapsed. By coincidence, gamekeeper Brown is reported to have been employed as a gamekeeper since 2006. Amazing.

Thomas and his colleagues from the RSPB Investigations team deserve a great deal of credit, especially for the innovative techniques they used to catch Brown. So too does Derbyshire Constabulary and the CPS. The resulting punishment for Brown, convicted of seven offences – 100 hours community service – delivered by District Judge Caroline Goulborn (famed for the recent cat-in-the-bin-case) is pathetic, especially when you consider the sentencing options available, which include fines up to £5,000 and a six month prison term for each offence. Had Brown not been ordered to pay £10,000 costs, some might have concluded that he had got off very lightly. Depending on who pays for these costs, and whether he keeps his job as a gamekeeper, some may be certain he got off lightly.

Derbyshire gamekeeper guilty of using illegal trap

The long-running trial that began over two months ago against Derbyshire gamekeeper Glenn Brown concluded today, and he was found guilty of using an illegal trap to try and catch birds of prey on the National Trust’s Howden Moor in the Peak District. The court heard that he was interested in protecting the grouse where he worked. The trial began on 11 April 2011 at Chesterfield Magistrates Court.

Brown was caught after RSPB investigators installed covert cameras overlooking a trap and filmed him over a period of time visiting the trap. He was unlawfully using a pigeon as a lure bird – this is illegal and is an indication that birds of prey were the target species he was trying to catch. He operated traps on land in the Upper Derwent Valley owned by the National Trust but leased by another party between 14 April and 25 May 2010.

Brown was found guilty of seven offences under the Wildlife & Countryside Act 1981 and the Animal Welfare Act 2010.

He was given 100 hours community service and ordered to pay £10,000 costs.

BBC news story here including video

More on this story later. Congratulations to the RSPB investigators for catching another criminal gamekeeper at it, and to Derbyshire Police and the Crown Prosecution Service for seeing the case through to trial. In the BBC news video, it is reported that Brown is the 100th gamekeeper to be convicted of crimes against birds of prey. So, Alex Hogg, Chairman of the Scottish Gamekeeper’s Association, still think it’s “unfair to accuse gamekeepers of wildlife crime“?

Poisoned golden eagle at Glen Orchy – two years on…

Two years ago today, this dead golden eagle was discovered by hill walkers in Glen Orchy, Argyll. Government tests later showed it had been poisoned by the illegal pesticide Carbofuran. This poisoning incident made the national press (e.g. here).

Several days later, a multi-agency search was conducted in and around Glen Orchy. The police-led operation included the Oban Community Policing Team, specialist wildlife crime officers from three police forces (Strathclyde, Lothian & Borders and Central), experts from the National Wildlife Crime Unit, pesticide experts from the Scottish Government and representatives from the RSPB and Scottish SPCA. The police said afterwards that they were following a positive line of inquiry.

Meanwhile, during the police search two handguns were found in gamekeeper Tom McKellar’s loft. Eighteen months later in December 2010, McKellar was convicted at the High Court in Glasgow for having prohibited weapons. However, he avoided the usual mandatory five year custodial sentence and instead received 300 hours community service. Story here

So what happened to that ‘positive line of inquiry’ in the eagle poisoning investigation? Good question.

Bird boycott

Here is a letter that was published in today’s edition of The Scotsman:

“I recently had another holiday in Scotland – my third visit this year – principally to do bird and wildlife watching.

Like many others I have always wanted to go bird watching in Malta and Cyprus, but have boycotted these islands on principal because of their hunting and persecution of birds.

On each visit to Scotland I learn of more illegal poisoning and persecution of raptors – including a major tourist attraction, the iconic golden eagle.

I am beginning to think that my patronage of your tourist industry is somewhat hypocritical in view of my stance on the European countries I mentioned.

It appears that wildlife crime detection is grossly underfunded and that penalties are woefully inadequate.

What good is a fine of a few thousand pounds to a gamekeeper whose multi-millionaire lord and master will pay the fine anyway?

I think a universal boycott by wildlide enthusiasts would be damaging to the economies of Scotland, and I implore the Scottish Government to make a concerted effort to stamp out these crimes.”

P. Bateson, Halifax.

The Scotsman letter here

‘Unfair to accuse gamekeepers of wildlife crime’, says gamekeeper Alex

In an article published in The Courier on 30 May 2011, Ian Thomson, an investigator for the RSPB, expressed his concern about the high number of wild birds illegally killed in Tayside. 14 incidents were recorded there between March 2010 and March 2011.  In the same article, it is reported that PC Bryan Prestwood, a wildlife crime officer based in Angus, ‘believes the biggest problem is with gamekeepers and land managers’. Full article here

In an angry response published on 6 June 2011, Alex Hogg suggested it was ‘unfair to accuse gamekeepers of wildlife crime’. His letter here

I think people will make up their own minds Alex, based on the factual evidence and government statistics. You’ve even said yourself, on many occasions, that if gamekeepers were to be given licences to kill protected raptors then illegal raptor poisoning would stop. This notion was also repeated last week by David Hendry of Cardney Estate in his BBC 2 Landward interview. Quite a strange prophecy from a ‘profession’ that claims not to be involved with wildlife crime, don’t you think?

For those still in any doubt whether some gamekeepers are involved in willdife crime, and specifically raptor persecution, here’s a link to a piece we wrote on the issue last year, including some revealing statistics provided by the RSPB. Here’s a link to another piece we wrote last year, with the most recently-published RSPB statistics. These show clearly that 85% of people who were convicted of illegally killing birds of prey between 2003-2008 were gamekeepers!

Sleeping gamekeeper fined over guns on table

A GAMEKEEPER who was found asleep in a chair in his kitchen with a shotgun and rifle lying on the kitchen table was fined £160 at Inverness Sheriff Court this week.

Martin MacKenzie has been suspended from his job and also faces losing his firearms licence.

Depute Fiscal Karen Smith said police had to attend the house at Mains of Aberarder and found Mackenzie asleep at the kitchen table.

The rifle and shotgun were lying on the table, she told Sheriff Ian Abercrombie.

Mackenzie (36) of Craggan Valley, Kiltarlity, admitted on May 18 last year failing to comply with conditions of his firearms certificate that he failed to keep the guns in a secure designated place.

Craig Wood, solicitor, said Mackenzie was married with two children, and had been a keeper at Arberarder for 10 years. “Since this incident he has been suspended by his employers.”

Mr Wood added that a letter had been received from the Chief Constable asking for Mackenzie’s certificate to be revoked, but this was the subject of an appeal.

“He had been using his guns and intended to clean them,” said Mr Wood. “He took several phone calls and when the police attended he accepts he should have dealt with it more expeditiously. He is a perfectly reasonable human being.”

So, it appears that Northern Constabulary consider falling asleep in your home in charge of unsecured firearms an offence serious enough to revoke a certificate. No complaints here and well done to the newly-appointed Chief Constable of Northern Constabulary, Mr George Graham. It follows then surely that the Moy and Skibo gamekeepers, convicted last week, should also have their firearms certificates revoked given the seriousness of their crimes? If you measure seriousness in terms of the court’s punishment, then both James Rolfe (Moy Estate) and Dean Barr (Skibo Estate) committed crimes far more serious than the one committed by Martin MacKenzie at Aberarder:

Rolfe = £1500 fine; Barr = £3300 fine; MacKenzie = £160 fine.

I also wonder whether MacKenzie is a member of the SGA, and if so, whether he faces sanctions in light of his firearms conviction? Incidentally, there’s still no public statement of condemnation from the SGA over last week’s convictions of the Moy & Skibo keepers. They also haven’t said whether Rolfe or Barr are SGA members and if so, whether their SGA membership has been terminated after their criminal convictions. Hopefully the SGA’s bed-fellows at PAW Scotland will be asking these questions.

Many thanks to the contributor who brought this article to our attention.

Highland News

More on the Moy case

According to an article published in The Scotsman (view here), a post mortem carried out on the dead red kite discovered in the vehicle used by gamekeeper James Rolfe on Moy Estate last June, revealed it had broken legs and had died as a result of a blow to the head. Rolfe was convicted for being in possession of the dead kite. Why weren’t charges brought against anyone for the unlawful killing of this bird?

In the same article, it is reported that over a five-week period, the remains of a further two dead red kites, six illegal baited spring traps, a trapped hen harrier, and a poison bait laced with a banned agricultural pesticide (poison) were also recovered from the estate. No arrests or charges have been made in connection with these incidents.

Why not?

In an article in Birdwatch Magazine, further gruesome details are revealed about the discovery of a severed red kite leg and wing tags belonging to a red kite that was being followed by satellite tracking, all hidden in holes covered by moss. The article also reports that four golden eagle leg rings were discovered in Rolfe’s possession. No arrests or charges have been made in connection with these incidents.

Why not?

You may wish to ask the following people:

Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service: pn_copfs@scotland.gsi.gov.uk

Northern Constabulary Force Wildlife Crime Co-ordinator, Chief Inspector Matthew Reiss: matthew.reiss@northern.pnn.police.uk

Environment Minister for Scotland, Stewart Stevenson MSP: msp@stewartstevenson.net

Moy Estate results

Today at Inverness Sheriff Court, gamekeeper James Roderick Rolfe, 20, was convicted of being in possession of a dead red kite which was found in his vehicle during a police raid on the Moy Estate in June last year. Rolfe said he had found the kite caught in a trap set for stoats. It had not been poisoned. Rolfe was fined £1,500 for possession of the dead bird.

The images here show the dead kite in the back of his vehicle. No explanation has been given to account for the obvious injury this bird suffered to its head area. According to the Inverness Courier, Rolfe claimed the bird was already dead when he found it.

Another gamekeeper working on Moy Estate was accused of being in possession of 56 gull eggs. The court accepted his plea of not guilty.

Northern Constabulary press statement

Inverness Courier news report