- The Guardian, Saturday December 1 2007
Pro-hunting campaigners said the decision demonstrated that the law was a bad one and ought to be scrapped. It came as a blow to animal rights activists who have had some success in bringing prosecutions under the act.
Tony Wright, 53, was found guilty last year of breaking the ban while leading a hunt on Exmoor. He was fined £500 after being accused of urging his hounds on as the hunt chased a fox down a hill and doing nothing to stop them when they pursued another across open moorland.
Wright, professional huntsman with Exmoor Foxhounds, had argued that he was following an exemption that allows hunts to flush out foxes to guns.
At Exeter crown court yesterday Judge Cottle said he was satisfied Wright reasonably believed, perhaps optimistically, that he had put in place safeguards he thought would ensure compliance with the act.
Judge Cottle, who sat with two magistrates, said: "It seems to us that any given set of facts may be susceptible to differing interpretations. The result is an unhappy state of affairs which leaves all those involved in a position of uncertainty."
After the hearing Wright said: "I am delighted with the result, which is what I believed all along."
Mike Hobday, the head of the prosecution unit of the League Against Cruel Sports, which brought the original private prosecution, said it was a "deeply surprising decision".
