Press launch from Cheshire Police:
twenty ninth August 2023
TEENAGER PLEADS GUILTY TO CAUSING NESTON MARSHLAND FIRE
A 15-year-old boy has pleaded responsible to intentionally inflicting a big fireplace on marshland in Neston.
The teenager, who can’t be named for authorized causes, appeared at Chester Magistrates on 25 August for trial. He pleaded responsible on the primary day to arson and harm of a web site of particular scientific curiosity. He was handed a nine-month referral order and ordered to pay £200 court docket charges and £22 sufferer surcharge.
Two different 15-year-old boys, who can also’t be named for authorized causes, pleaded responsible to arson and harm at an earlier listening to. They had been additionally handed a nine-month referral order and ordered to pay £120 court docket prices and £22 sufferer surcharge.
The fireplace occurred, at round 6.15pm on Saturday 19 March 2022 in Parkgate Marshlands. Four younger suspects had been seen fleeing the scene not lengthy after the hearth began.
The three boys admitted they had been on the scene however not who set the hearth.
The fireplace broken an intensive space of tall well-established reedbed vegetation. The most important affect of the hearth is more likely to be the lack of breeding habitat for specialist hen species in addition to wintering roost websites. The implication of the harm to the positioning and the wildlife was vital.
DC Adam Spencer mentioned:
“What these boys did devastated the breeding grounds for protected species beneath the 1981 Wildlife and Countryside Act.
While all of them admitted to being current on the web site, none of them would admit who began fireplace, leaving us with no choice however to prosecute all three youngsters, that means that they may all now be tarred with legal data which can have lifelong implications.
The affect of their actions that day can’t be underestimated; the hearth brought about vital harm to the marshes which is more likely to have a major affect on native wildlife for years to come back.
The message right here is suppose earlier than you act“.
Ginny Hinton, Deputy Director, Natural England Cheshire to Lancashire Team, mentioned:
“Natural England assisted in investigating this crime and in assessing the harm to this essential nature web site. Our survey confirmed the hearth had devastated a big space of reedbed and saltmarsh, destroying habitat for endangered birds just like the Hen Harrier and Bittern. It will take a very long time for the positioning to get well.
This incident highlights the necessity to observe the Countryside Code and respect, shield and benefit from the nice open air. This additionally supplies a reminder of the far reaching affect of fireplace on our well-loved pure areas“.
ENDS
The huge saltmarsh at Parkgate on the Dee Estuary is a well-recognized web site to many birders, significantly within the winter when this essential web site attracts Hen harriers, Peregrines, Short-eared owls, Barn owls, Merlin, Kestrels, wildfowl and wading birds, however it’s additionally an essential breeding web site for Marsh harriers, Bearded tits, Cetti’s warbler and others.
The RSPB carried out an evaluation of the hearth harm in 2022 and mentioned that about ten hectares of the marsh was burnt through the arson assault, together with all of the reedbed vegetation and a few areas of saltmarsh vegetation.
I’d argue {that a} nine-month referral order and pitiful court docket prices is unlikely to discourage different would-be arsonists and doesn’t, for my part, mirror the seriousness of the harm they intentionally brought about.
