Hunt sab arrested over assault on 81 year old man

Alexandra Dennis was fined over the attack on retired fine art consultant Richard de Pelet.

The brutal assault, which sent the elderly victim crashing to the ground, took place in Dorset in December 2021 and took more than a year to come to trial. A shocking video shows the victim picking up an object from the ground, his assailant then runs up to him, seizes the object, identified as a camera lens and forcibly strikes him on the head with it. Mr De Pelet then falls to the ground where he lies for several seconds before being helped up.

Ms Dennis was fined £959 for attack, of which £100 will be paid to Mr De Pelet. A spokesperson for the Blackmore and Sparkford Vale Hunt, speaking on behalf of the victim who was understandably shaken, said they were “relieved that justice had been done” following the guilty verdict on 19th December 2022.

They said: “This shocking incident highlights the horrific abuse members of our community suffer at the hands of hunt saboteurs. While he has recovered physically, the elderly victim understandably remains emotionally scarred by the violent actions of Alexandra Dennis.”

For many rural people, particularly the more elderly, following hounds while trail hunting remains an important social activity and can be one of limited avenues of interaction in more isolated areas of the countryside. In a separate incident, hunt staff and supporters gave up their own time to scrub graffiti off a bridge after saboteurs daubed the structure with anti-hunting slogans. The team from the Meynell Hunt cleaned the words “Hunt Scum **** off” from the parapet of a bridge at Blithfiled Reservoir.

Following a series of incidents on Ministry of Defence owned Land Defence Secretary Ben Wallace announced a crackdown on saboteurs. In a tweet, the former Scots Guards Officer said: “The only people that should be masked and camouflaged on MOD land are Armed Forces personnel training to defend the UK. People who intimidate and threaten other users are not welcome.”