Hysterical!

[LittleRooketRider]

I can't decide what is more amusing...

The blatant flop of the anti's "national joke..I mean er..demo"...over 2000 invited, 350 expected, official count of 64 present (on top of this their desperate claims of success eg. "strong support and solidarity nationwide", "over 100 present" see above)

The fact that they were protesting for "justice" for somebody who stepped out in front of a hunt horse and was subsequently knocked over, and then were encouraging protesters to walk along the 'officially closed off for health and safety reasons' footpath that crossed the track when horse came to that point of the race - they were prevented.

Or this..the local magazine quoting Sabinder
http://www.blackmorevale.co.uk/350-...re-Sparkford/story-26129274-detail/story.html

 

[Doormouse]

I like the emphasis on 'peaceful demonstration' and 'family day out'! They still managed to get themselves arrested!

 

[LittleRooketRider]

Yes...standing in front of oncoming cars and trying to push them backwards..very peaceful.

Otherwise the P2P was a massive success.

 

[Alec Swan]

I like the emphasis on 'peaceful demonstration' and 'family day out'! They still managed to get themselves arrested!

^^^^ This!

Yes...standing in front of oncoming cars and trying to push them backwards..very peaceful.

…….. .

That other all essential idiot King Canute springs to mind!

Alec.

 

[Christmas Crumpet]

I nearly squashed the very drunk lady with black hair over as she walked in front of my car as we were driving in. Apparently she got arrested later on. Shame!!

 

[Countryman]

They do seem to enjoy throwing themselves in front of moving objects, be they cars or horses. Undoubtedly if anyone had been hurt they would have blamed the hunt and complained of a 'deliberate vicious attack'. I just hope the police and CPS take a note of the behaviour of these people.

 

[LittleRooketRider]

The hunt had hired private security I believe and their were police present at the p2p and the kennels. I hear there were a number of arrests of antis/sabs/call them what you will.

 

[marianne1981]

Have any of you actually seen the video? I did and it is pretty awful - the hunt rider rode straight at this lady who was just standing there, ran her down and didnt even stop? If this was in any other situation, would you find this acceptable???

 

[twiggy2]

pop the following in the search bar on you tube and then if you still believe that the hunt rider was in the right then re-post...
Blackmore & Sparkford Vale Huntsman Mark Doggrell runs over a Hunt Saboteur

that video turns my stomach, what a thing to do to someone, I don't care who was for or against hunting on that day-what happened to that woman was wrong

 

[marianne1981]

It is very telling that none of the other posters have condemned this behaviour, instead turning it into a bit of a "joke". As someone said, hunting doesnt need any help to bring itself down, it does that itself. This was wrong - plain and simple. If a sab did this to somebody.... that would also be wrong. Take some responsibility of "your own" and you would gain more respect.

 

[marianne1981]

The fact that they were protesting for "justice" for somebody who stepped out in front of a hunt horse and was subsequently knocked over, and then were encouraging protesters to walk along the 'officially closed off for health and safety reasons' footpath that crossed the track when horse came to that point of the race - they were prevented.

Do yourself a favour OP - get the facts right before stating the lady "stepped out" in front of the rider - please watch the video which clearly shows she did not indeed step out in front of the horse, at all, she was standing still when ridden at - take a look.

 

[Circe]

pop the following in the search bar on you tube and then if you still believe that the hunt rider was in the right then re-post...
Blackmore & Sparkford Vale Huntsman Mark Doggrell runs over a Hunt Saboteur

that video turns my stomach, what a thing to do to someone, I don't care who was for or against hunting on that day-what happened to that woman was wrong

This^^^^
what a terrible thing to do to someone, so lucky she wasn't killed.
Kx

 

[Doormouse]

Having watched the video several times, awful though it is I don't think you could say it was done on purpose. If you look at the position of the vehicle it was parked in the gateway blocking the view to a certain extent both from the road and the field. The 2 Sabs were standing in a blind spot if you were coming round the corner at any speed. As the huntsman came round the corner at speed the 2 Sabs were definitely taken by surprise and both actually stepped back towards the track into the field, had they stepped forward he would have missed them. Not necessarily their fault, they looked a bit like rabbits in the headlights as it happened. I am surprised they didn't hear the horse coming but perhaps they didn't realise it would be coming through the gate. Huntsman do tend to be travelling at speed during a days hunting as they want to keep as close to hounds as possible to ensure they are safe.

I really think it wasn't deliberate, there wasn't really enough time on either side for it to be intentional. However, he should have stopped when he realised what happened.

 

[twiggy2]

Having watched the video several times, awful though it is I don't think you could say it was done on purpose. If you look at the position of the vehicle it was parked in the gateway blocking the view to a certain extent both from the road and the field. The 2 Sabs were standing in a blind spot if you were coming round the corner at any speed. As the huntsman came round the corner at speed the 2 Sabs were definitely taken by surprise and both actually stepped back towards the track into the field, had they stepped forward he would have missed them. Not necessarily their fault, they looked a bit like rabbits in the headlights as it happened. I am surprised they didn't hear the horse coming but perhaps they didn't realise it would be coming through the gate. Huntsman do tend to be travelling at speed during a days hunting as they want to keep as close to hounds as possible to ensure they are safe.

I really think it wasn't deliberate, there wasn't really enough time on either side for it to be intentional. However, he should have stopped when he realised what happened.

I am happy to agree to disagree on the point you have raised but then it brings us to the point that after the lady being run over he did not stop! that speaks volumes to me even if I did agree (which I do not) that running her down was accidental.

I am not sure how you can come to the conclusion that the truck was blocking the huntsman view from that little clip though,

 

[twiggy2]

double posted in error

 

[twiggy2]

also the fact that the huntsman claimed that the sab 'jumped' out in front of him is clearly not the case in that video and if he had not been able to see her on his approach then surely that would have been the reason given?

 

[Doormouse]

I am happy to agree to disagree on the point you have raised but then it brings us to the point that after the lady being run over he did not stop! that speaks volumes to me even if I did agree (which I do not) that running her down was accidental.

I am not sure how you can come to the conclusion that the truck was blocking the huntsman view from that little clip though,

Well I would suspect that is why the CPS have dropped the case as it is definitely something that each person will see slightly differently. From my eyes I see that the vehicle and the hedge line may be blocking a certain amount of view, from your eyes it looks different.

I do agree he should have stopped.

 

[twiggy2]

Well I would suspect that is why the CPS have dropped the case as it is definitely something that each person will see slightly differently. From my eyes I see that the vehicle and the hedge line may be blocking a certain amount of view, from your eyes it looks different.

I do agree he should have stopped.

surely though it depends on his line of travel before the truck? which we do not know from the clip I am viewing (have you seen any other ones?) and as my above post he never claimed he did not see her he claimed she 'jumped' out in front of him!

 

[Doormouse]

also the fact that the huntsman claimed that the sab 'jumped' out in front of him is clearly not the case in that video and if he had not been able to see her on his approach then surely that would have been the reason given?

I think it all happened so fast that I doubt any of the parties really know what happened exactly. The sab did take a step backwards, not her fault at all, split second decision in that situation.

Horses will naturally avoid running into things as a rule and I think it would take a lot of skill to deliberately make a horse run into a moving target. It shouldn't have happened, I feel very sorry for the woman who was hurt but I don't believe it was deliberate.

 

[Dunlin]

I can see why the CPS have thrown this out. You cannot see on the video that there is a hedge to the right of the gate, granted I would expect you can see over it on horseback but again, it's all questionable when the CPS look at it. There's a lot going on for the rider to look at, small gap to get through between Landy and gateway, lots of sabs out there (which do have a habit of getting themselves in a danger zone), where are the Hounds etc. As Doormouse said it's really difficult to aim a horse at a target to deliberately mow down, if you watch the video and keep hitting pause you can see the horse swerve it's body and lift the front legs to try and avoid hitting the lady as best as possible. However, the fact the Huntsman did not even look back, slow down or stop does speak volumes to me, but on the other hand, having seen what some anti's are capable of I don't think I would have wanted to hang around on my own either!

The following videos are of the attack on Mike Lane who was beaten unconscious in January this year by anti's swinging metal rods on ropes. Naturally the video's come with a warning of "violent behaviour".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdc67ULy66k

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8Hev8uh7Es

It was a bad accident that happened to this 'Nid' lady and naturally I hope she's okay but it's got to be said, if you go out sabbing the hunt, there is a high chance you are going to get hurt and as I said, these people do have a habit of deliberately putting themselves in harms way as I (and others) witnessed on Sunday by running infront of cars attending the P2P and even trying to push the cars backwards, I mean seriously, come on, some of them would make excellent footballers. They run infront of a car, try to push it backwards, slip over in the mud and then writhe around on the floor in hysterics claiming they were violently run down.

 

[twiggy2]

if you watch the video and keep hitting pause you can see the horse swerve it's body and lift the front legs to try and avoid hitting the lady as best as possible.

all credit to the horse yes it tries to avoid her the rider however takes no action for avoid the human in their path.

the hunts local to me have lots of follows on foot are they at the same risk-what happened at the demonstraion and at other hunts is nothing to do with what I have viewed in that video-that people are trying to excuse what he did because of what others have done is laughable in this instance-I am not commenting on this again as I am so appauled that people are defending his actions

 

[Countryman]

This was clearly an unfortunate accident. HOWEVER the sabs do seem to frequently put themselves at unnecessary risk, perhaps for PR gain. Clearly if you trespass on private land people will not be expecting you to be there, and wearing camouflage clothing is rarely a good idea if trying to let a horse see you. We all know the importance of hunt staff getting to hounds ASAP when they have to - hence why everyone gets out of their way.

In addition to this, I don't think you can blame the man for not stopping. Frankly I doubt anybody in their right mind would slow down when near potentially violent thugs as was seen at the Tedworth carrying iron bars, and when they are angrily shouting at you the sensible thing was clearly to steer well clear. All credit to the Master on the day who did brave the other protestors and attempted to help.

 

[Cinnamontoast]

Don't inderstand Sabinder's comment: is it sarcastic? Irony? He's madly in favour of hunting.

 

[popsdosh]

Have any of you actually seen the video? I did and it is pretty awful - the hunt rider rode straight at this lady who was just standing there, ran her down and didnt even stop? If this was in any other situation, would you find this acceptable???

Like all videos they use very tightly edited so you only see one side of what occurred! One could question why at that time the video was being recorded was it possible they were expecting it to happen!! Maybe thats why the CPS dropped it

 

[marianne1981]

OK, so you think she "put" herself there willingly to be ran over - potentially killed if the horse had kicked her in the head? She had something like 6 broken ribs!! You think she volunteered to do that - that is idiotic! I'm sorry, but if we were on any other subject, and you saw this video, I doubt very much you would be defending that huntsman. Popsdosh - the huntsman didnt even stop - who in their right mind would carry on after doing something like this?

Put it this way - if this was a sab on the horse, and the huntsman standing on the ground, would you still defend it as an "accident?" no violence like this is right, from either side. Oh, and I believe sabs have their dashcams on all the time - I am not a sab but my dashcam is on all the time my engine is, so was just lucky to have it there right place right time. The CPS are re-opening the case, damn right!

 

[twiggy2]

The CPS are re-opening the case, damn right!

I read they were reviewing the decision previously made not to take it further but had not heard they were re-opening the case. I think they should.

 

[LittleRooketRider]

I read they were reviewing the decision previously made not to take it further but had not heard they were re-opening the case. I think they should.

What for? yes he probably should have stopped, but given the reception he gets from them normally and teh fact they were trying to call hounds away, I don't blame him. But this was not an intentional act, it was an accident.

 

[Alec Swan]

OK, …….. She had something like 6 broken ribs!! …….. !

Can you provide clear and unequivocal evidence of that? 'Something like'? You sound none too sure of the actual injuries sustained. Is the truth not that the lady concerned was discharged immediately from hospital with only bumps and bruises?

Regarding the fact that the rider failed to stop, under normal circumstances, then of course any reasonable rider would do so, but the situation of attempting to gather hounds, whilst there were those, the injured lady amongst them, who were doing their best to disrupt a legally carried out sport, would render the situation as far from 'normal circumstances'. In the rider's boots, I would also have carried on, and to do so was responsible and correct, and anything but a criminal offence.

If the CPS, following requests to do so, decide to review the case, there is clearly no criminal offence, either by intent or by neglect, to be considered, and the decision that there was no case to answer, will be upheld.

Those who were ultimately responsible for the lady's injuries were those with whom she joined, who with the intent of disrupting a legal activity, placed themselves in the way of danger.

Alec.

 

[marianne1981]

She in fact suffered 7 broken ribs, sorry Alec. In hospital for 3 weeks - http://www.northdevonjournal.co.uk/...ed-seriously/story-26001234-detail/story.html

I doubt very much that somebody who had to be airlifted to hospital could "go home on the same day"!!! Honestly Alec, if this were a sab on the horse, and the huntsman was standing there, would you call it an accident then?

 

[LittleRooketRider]

She in fact suffered 7 broken ribs, sorry Alec. In hospital for 3 weeks - http://www.northdevonjournal.co.uk/...ed-seriously/story-26001234-detail/story.html

I doubt very much that somebody who had to be airlifted to hospital could "go home on the same day"!!! Honestly Alec, if this were a sab on the horse, and the huntsman was standing there, would you call it an accident then?

Actually, that is a reporton information given to a journalist and therefore not fact/proof of her injuries. And yes people who are airlifted can "go home on the same day", I have witnessed or been told of several riding accidents where the riders involved have been airlifted to hospital due to fears of serious neck/back/head injuries which have then prove dto be nothing but bruising and have subsequently walked out of hospital the same day. Regardless of the time she spent in hospital or who was on the horse and on the ground that does not make it intentional. It is clearly a very unfortunate accident.

Just to add...

Given that they are claiming that the horse was wearing blinkers to prevent it from seeing its "target" and therefore take avoiding action, I really struggle to believe any of their outlandish claims.