Three young hunters were yesterday fined €1,000 each and ordered to do 300 hours of community service after they admitted to vandalising 104 trees at the Foresta 2000 woodland in Mellieħa last April.
Darren Cross, 24, from Birkirkara, Noel Grech, 24, and Charlot Chetcuti, 20, both from Mosta, pleaded guilty to sawing off the trees and saplings, most of which were planted to replace 3,000 trees destroyed in a previous systematic act of vandalism in October 2007.
The trees were hacked away on the night of April 25 in a similar style to that employed by the vandals who struck in 2007. The perpetrators of the first incident were never caught.
Police sources said the accused told officers they were angry about the reduced spring hunting season announced this year.
The shrubs had been bought with €58,000 donated by the public following an outcry about the 2007 vandalism.
At the arraignment, defence lawyer Anġlu Farrugia downplayed the incident while discussing the case with Magistrate Anthony Vella saying only “a few trees” were damaged. Police Inspector Anthony Portelli specified that, actually, 104 trees had been damaged and not just a few and the lawyer rebutted that the charge did not go into the actual number.
After the accused confirmed their guilty plea, the magistrate fined them €1,000 and ordered them to pay €1,320 each in damages. They will also have to do 300 hours of community service, according to the instructions of a probation officer.
The magistrate warned them that if they did not pay the money back or commit another crime, they would go straight to prison.
Lawyer Edward Gatt and Mark Busuttil were also defence counsel.
The Mellieħa local council yesterday expressed satisfaction at the police work, which resulted in the arraignments. The council urged the public to take care of the environment and condemned any form of vandalism.
The Ministry for Resources and Rural Affairs also expressed appreciation to whoever helped in apprehending the culprits and reminded the public that, in October, there will be another re-planting of the trees.