Trapper fined Lm250 for having bird caller

A trapper, who was originally acquitted of making use of an electronic bird caller while trapping, was yesterday fined Lm250 after an appeal court ruled that the actual possession of the bird caller was illegal.

The Magistrates' Court had cleared Nazzareno Aquilina of trapping with the use of an electronic bird caller in Benghajsa on April 1 at about 6.35 p.m.

But the Attorney General appealed claiming that the first court had misapplied the legal argument within a legal notice that came into force on February 1 and through which the possession of the electronic bird caller was made illegal. This meant that one did not have to prove that the bird caller was intended for hunting or trapping.

Mr Justice Joseph Galea Debono, who presided over the appeal court, heard how on the day in question the police seized the electronic bird caller, that was switched off at the time, from a small room close to Aquilina's hunting hide.

Aquilina did not contest the possession of the equipment and told the police he had not made use of it.

But the judge noted that whether Aquilina was actually making use of the bird caller or not was not the issue. It had been proven that Aquilina was aware that there was an electronic bird caller in the hunting hide; in fact Aquilina did not contest its possession.

The legal notice specified that offering electronic hunting equipment for sale and the possession of such equipment was illegal. Therefore, although the first court was correct in acquitting Aquilina of hunting with an electronic bird caller, the court was wrong in acquitting him of its possession.

For this reason the judge fined Aquilina and banned him from hunting and from the possession of guns for a year.