Two Maltese hunters sentenced to long prison terms, plus a heavy fine.

Two men were today jailed in Malta for hunting illegally in the closed season.Joseph Darmanin, 39, of Qrendi was jailed for two years and fined €9,000 while Rene Bezzina, 27, of Gharghur, was jailed for a year and fined €5,000 after they were found guilty of hunting in the closed season in separate hearings.

Both have also been prohibited, for life, from holding a hunting licence and a licence to keep a firearm. Their firearms were confiscated.

 The two men were also found guilty of repeated offences…Inspector Ramon Mercieca prosecuted.

In a statement BirdLife said the two men were jailed for targeting protected White Storks on May 18 this year…It congratulated the ALE on their successful action and said that enforcement had been supported by effective court sentences such as those given in these cases if illegal hunting was to be controlled. (Perhaps this may be a wake up call to UK courts who all too often sentence offenders to just a few hundred hours community service)

“BirdLife Malta is hopeful that future court sentences will increasingly serve as real deterrents to illegal hunting,” BirdLife president Joseph Mangion said.

Read more about this story: http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20110519/local/two-arrests-for-illegal-hunting-as-large-flock-of-swans-flies-in.366197

Related Articles:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/02/swans-shot-and-killed-nea_n_830310.html

http://raptorpolitics.org.uk/2011/02/24/50-buzzards-poisoned-in-southern-germany/

Footnote:

What a pity existing wildlife legislation here in Britain is proving no deterrent in bringing an end to the killing of so-called “protected” raptors.

Isn’t it time we got our own house in order to end this scandal once and for all? The first thing our legislators need to do is bring in much tougher penalties and use them; a couple of hundred hours community service is pointless.

Malta has now shown the way forward by sentencing one hunter to two years and a second to one year, it’s about time UK courts followed this example..

Figures produced by the RSPB have shown that since 1989 forty-six Golden Eagles have been illegally killed in Scotland. Four additional BTO rings which had been placed on the legs of four young eagles in their eyrie prior to fledging were recovered in the pocket of a gamekeeper in SCOTLAND.

Scientist firmly believe that the number of eagles that may have been illegally killed in this short period could be twice as many, just the tip of an ice-burg. These figures are bad enough, but when you consider not a single person has been brought before the courts for any of these serious wildlife offences something it wrong and it need fixing now, not after another 50 eagles have been killed 

Footnote Read about Malta Animal cruelty below:

http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20110521/local/Call-for-longer-jail-terms-for-dog-atrocity.366442/comments:2