Highgate Farm Protest Camp - Thursday's Update

Was the rabbit a farmed animal or a field animal ?

Was the rabbit shot with a rifle or shotgun ? If it was the latter you would have heard the bang.

Do you have any evidence that the farmer was the one who a/ shot the rabbit or b/ threw it from his farm ?

Could it be some local/not so local country 'type' who dislikes your 'type' and shot the rabbit offsite and threw it at you to wind you up ?

You might also suspect the police, the local council or even an animal rightsist agitator who wishes to escalate the situation ! Which is not beyond the realms of possibility, is it ?

Unless you can put to bed all of those question and demonstrate the balanced way you've come to your conclusions - with evidence - you are letting yourself down and those who support your cause.

By inviting people to call the farmer, after making such a serious allegation, one which amounts to being libelous, you're putting yourself on very shaky ground when before, you had the moral high ground.

I suspect you're being played.

You will now, no doubt, suspect that I'm the farmers solicitor, a police officer and/or the one who shot the rabbit. We all love a good conspiracy, don't we ?

I do hope you can answer some of the points raised.

Good luck with your protest :)

The rabbit was thrown at the camp and hit one of the tents, leaving a visible mark. The area it hit could only have been reached from throwing the rabbit over the farms perimeter fence. It was definitely thrown from inside the farm, which is why we would encourage people to complain to the farm.

The police also believe it was thrown from the farm, and CID have been at the farm today to interview the residents.

We are actually surprised that the farmer (or a family member) would resort to this, and if the rabbit had been thrown anywhere else in the camp, we would have assumed that it had been thrown from a passing vehicle. As it is there is no physical way that could be the case. There are no nearby houses, and in fact local support has been very good.

From our contact with the police and council it seems escalating the situation is the last thing they wish to do - and they seem pretty annoyed by this incident for this very reason.

It was a wild rabbit, and had probably been dead some time. I believe it was shot with a rifle.

Thank you for your support.

The rabbit had holes in it's legs, it had been hung for meat before this pervert thought it would be clever to throw it at a peaceful camp. The camp itself has spent all week building a good relationship with police in the run up to the national which the police really seemed to like, this incident made them pretty damn angry.

The police van was parked by the road side of camp all evening, The only way the person who attacked the camp could have done this without being spotted was from the bushes backing onto the camp.

I'd also like to point out at this point that the badger sized hole in the bush near the back of the camp got, in my opinion, human sized over that night. The grass by the hole had been flattened outwards towards the camp too, coming from Douglas' farm.

Coincidence? Conspirosy?

I think you should insist on the police viewing this as a threat, if we put a rabbit with a noose around his neck on the doorstep of an animal abuser we would be banged up for years. A noose is a threat of violence, a threat to kill.

On the face of it, it sounds more like a local bumpkin playing a sick prank than anyone connected to the farm committing a malicious act.

You're still on shaky ground with the libelous comment above as, I beleive, are the publishers, Indymedia.

Take care !

Leaving dead or dying animals outside the homes of animal rights activists or even nailed to the front door is not new and has in fact gone on for a very long time. From Edwardian times when medical students ransacked the HQ of the BUAV and violently attacked those within the building to now animal abusers have resorted to this sort of intimidation. What I object to is the fact that if a dead animal, or a sanitary towel or a piece of excrement were laid at the door of a vivisector (and yes I am sure that such things have happened) the actions of the police and the media would be very different. Hopefully in this case the police and the courts will be fair and the perpetrator of the act will be violently arrested, have his or her home turned upside down, be kept in a police station for 3 days, remanded in custody and if found guilty face 14 years in prison followed by a lifelong CRASBo limiting their political activity for the rest of their lives. After all is that not what the police and vivisectors view as appropriate punishment for "animal rights extremists"? Would it not be hypocritical to not advocate the same treatment for an animal abuse extremist? In fact to be really fair let us say that the perpetrator was Joe Bloggs who happens to be an old pal of Brian Cass and the Douglas family why not go for a conspiracy charge?
By the way unlike animal abusers I do not think that activists would be so pathetic as to hide behind a screen in court or appear ashen faced on telly about the "ordeal". The rabbit was murdered and the corpse desecrated, far worse than the hysterics we still hear about the Gladys Hammond affair.
Think about it though why when animal rights activists who have simply run a campaign are serving 10 years or more should someone who has done worse get away with less? Indeed anything less is a clear show of bias towards the vivisection industry.

Phone NETCU and ask them for some advice on how to protect your right for peaceful campaigning in the face of these extremist attacks. Ask under what laws you could get an injunction to stop the farmer killing rabbits that they may later throw at you.

They may suggest not camping there in which case point out the police role is often to defend lawful protest which this is... not to determine the course of the lawful protest.

Worth a try. Would be interesting to hear the response ;)

Very good point. After all the joint committee into policing and protest did say in March that protest should not just be facilitated by the police but actually facilitated. In fact Lincolnshire police (credit where it is due) even put up road signs warning people to slow down past the camp.
Maybe we should also meet with ACPO to discuss animal abuse extremists and demand that they all be locked up after all the vivisectors and hunters have had nice cosy little meetings with them (maybe cos they are more of a dodgy private limited company than anything resembling public interest) so we should have a turn as well. Maybe NETCU could furnish us with private information on the evil ones to prove their impartiality after all Steve Pearl and his chums had no qualms about breaching the Data Protection Act when they gave info on activists to HLS and countless other scumbags.