Two fined for cutting down trees

Land agent Myles Metcalfe and contractor Douglas Atkin were charged with breaching a Tree Preservation Order which was in place near Hawes.

Metcalfe, 62, of Ashes Farm in Hawes, and Atkin, 47, of Skelton Hall in Marske, were found guilty of the breaches when they appeared before Northallerton magistrates on Monday.

Three trees were felled and a fourth was damaged in April last year.

Metcalfe, who was convicted of all four charges, was fined £4,000 and ordered to pay costs of £6,000. Atkin was also found guilty on all four counts.

He was fined £2,000 and was ordered to pay costs of £3,000.

The case against labourer Robert Young, 21, of Church Close in Redmire, was withdrawn by the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority, which had brought the prosecutions. All three men denied the charges brought under the Town and Country Planning Act 1990.

The court heard that the offences happened on land known as the Shearlings, near to the Brunt Acres Industrial Estate in Hawes.