Hare coursing charges denied by ex-trainer (From Durham Times)
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Hare coursing charges denied by ex-trainer
10:48am Tuesday 28th July 2009 in Search Module
CHARGE DENIED: Peter Easterby
TWO undercover animal welfare activists covertly filmed an alleged hare coursing event on land owned by three-times champion jumps trainer Peter Easterby, a court heard yesterday.
The former trainer, charged under his birth name of Miles Henry Easterby, is accused of permitting land to be used for hare coursing and attending a hare coursing event in March 2007.
Easterby went on trial alongside Major John Shaw, who is charged with the same offences.
The court heard how animal welfare activists Michelle Bryan and Joe Hashman attended the alleged hare coursing, held over two days in North Yorkshire, posing as a couple.
Mr Hashman secretly filmed the activities with a camera attached to binoculars.
The court was shown footage of the alleged hare coursing taking place on farmland owned by Easterby, 79, and Shaw, 56, near Malton, North Yorkshire.
Mr Hashman told Scarborough magistrates that over the two days there was more than 40 occasions of hare coursing taking place.
Hare coursing was outlawed by the Hunting Act in 2005, but many former participants now take part in a permissible sport known as Greyhound Field Trials, run under strict rules.
Mr Hashman said the people organising the North Yorkshire event had made “cosmetic changes” to the way it was held.
He told how he and Miss Bryan were given a map from a local pub which gave them directions to the alleged hare coursing. He said they were charged £5 each and were given a programme with the “runners and riders”.
He described how a man known as a “slipper” would be positioned in a canvas structure located in a field known as a “shy”.
Beaters would then drive the hares towards the shy, where the slipper would unleash two greyhounds.
People attending the event would line the field and create an “arena” for the dogs to chase the hares.
Mr Hashman said: “They were funnelling the hares into the field.
Guiding the hares, trying to control them one at a time... so they could set the dogs on them.”
Easterby, of Great Habton, and Shaw of Welburn, Kirkbymoorside, both North Yorkshire, deny the charges.
The trial continues.
