Shooting conditions - your take?

Rowley Birkin QC

Hi all. Quick question based on something that happened last night. Our kitchen window faces out onto our field around the house and beyond. The lands here are preserved. There's a crossroad 190m away. A van came up the road yesterday evening at a snails pace, stopped and a shot was fired from the van up towards the house, dropping a rabbit maybe 50m away from the garden bounds. A guy hopped the fence, up the field with a dog to retrieve the rabbit and left.

I used to have a .22 years ago and only ever used it for target shooting recreationally. One of the key things I remember being told over and over again was to be sure of the backstop. This guy seemed to be pretty cavalier in his attitude in firing towards the house and then trespassing to retrieve the rabbit. It also drove the pet dogs here crazy for hours barking after the noise and the strange dog in the field.

Asking the forum here for a take on it before potentially going further about it. Acceptable behaviour, slightly outside the norm or completely wrong?

Thanks!

cookimonster

I can't comment whether or not there's a 'reckless endangerment' law etc, but before commenting on legal issues, fireing a shot in the direction of a house is not good practice.

I'm pretty sure I'm close enough to the mark ( stand to be corrected) with the following.

-Shooting from a car is illegal regardless of circumstances or location of the car.

-Shooting from the road is illegal.

-Shooting / hunting on property were you do not have permissions is now illegal since last year regardless were ever the shot was taken.

Was this at night, did they use a lamp?, ......
Lamping onto land were you don't have permissions is illegal, as the act of searching etc with a light is considered hunting.

Rowley Birkin QC

cookimonster wrote: »

I can't comment whether or not there's a 'reckless endangerment' law etc, but before commenting on legal issues, fireing a shot in the direction of a house is not good practice.

I'm pretty sure I'm close enough to the mark ( stand to be corrected) with the following.

-Shooting from a car is illegal regardless of circumstances or location of the car.

-Shooting from the road is illegal.

-Shooting / hunting on property were you do not have permissions is now illegal since last year regardless were ever the shot was taken.

Was this at night, did they use a lamp?, ......
Lamping onto land were you don't have permissions is illegal, as the act of searching etc with a light is considered hunting.

Thanks. It was about 19:00 yesterday so bright outside.

meathstevie

cookimonster wrote: »

I can't comment whether or not there's a 'reckless endangerment' law etc, but before commenting on legal issues, fireing a shot in the direction of a house is not good practice.

I'm pretty sure I'm close enough to the mark ( stand to be corrected) with the following.

-Shooting from a car is illegal regardless of circumstances or location of the car.

-Shooting from the road is illegal.

-Shooting / hunting on property were you do not have permissions is now illegal since last year regardless were ever the shot was taken.

Was this at night, did they use a lamp?, ......
Lamping onto land were you don't have permissions is illegal, as the act of searching etc with a light is considered hunting.

I agree with you Cookimonster but I was under the impression that shooting on land where you don’t have permission has always been known as poaching and illegal.

Cass

If this was a criminal act or you think it is then the place to go is your local Garda station. Provide them with the details of the person and/or vehicle, make your complaint and allow them to follow it up. They will interview the other person/party and make a determination if any laws were broken, and then act accordingly.

cookimonster

meathstevie wrote: »

I agree with you Cookimonster but I was under the impression that shooting on land where you don’t have permission has always been known as poaching and illegal.

I'll refer to an older post from another thread-

Thread -

https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2058034215

Post -

cookimonster wrote: »

https://www.google.ie/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://revisedacts.lawreform.ie/eli/1976/act/39/revised/en/pdf%3Fannotations%3Dtrue&ved=2ahUKEwjKubDbmovmAhVvRhUIHY3-BlgQFjAAegQIBhAB&usg=AOvVaw02rudbs68wHGmnyWEwUHbC

I've just read the article and belive it makes many assumptions based on the contraventions of the Wildlife Act.
It doesn't cleary say what this man was charged with, it makes the assumption that it was a charge of roaming land in contravention of the Wildlife Act.. What was the actual recorded charge before thr courts?

The making of rabbit stew 'illegal' Ha, ha, ha, I wet myself laughing.... but in this case maybe not!

The actual offence is under Section 44 Unlawful hunting or entry on land and other miscellaneous matters.
This then makes anything he did from that point forward illegal. This inculdes the hunting of any fauna and section 72 (?) details items etc that are used in the illegal act, this case dogs.

So as far as I can make out. The man entered onto someone else's property in order to hunt. From that point on what he hunted and how he hunted was illegal. If he had permission the hunting of rabbits with dogs in itself is not illegal.

Still doesn't give the Judge carte blanche to over egg his feelings on the subject.

This seems to tie up any speculation or interpretation as to the leagal meaning of poaching in a neat bundle and adds in penalties that can see you kit used in that offence confiscated.