property

I personally can’t fully understand why the farmer here was so keen to get this vehicle off his land if a rescue vehicle was on the way. The fact that the owner but passenger was drunk does not seem not seem material either. This story tells us a lot about rural/urban tensions….                                   

A farmer who used a telehandler to pick up a car and dump it in a road to defend his property has been cleared of dangerous driving and criminal damage.

Robert Hooper, 57, had told Durham Crown Court he felt “frightened and threatened” when he took the action.

He had argued an “Englishman’s home is his castle”, and he had been assaulted before he used his vehicle to remove the Corsa in County Durham last June.

His partner Kate Henderson said he had been through “eight months of hell”.

Supporters cheered the couple outside the court after the jury cleared Mr Hooper following a four-day trial.