Affiliations: Three Counties Hunt Saboteurs, Gloucestershire Badger Office, Lynn Sawyer
Location: Gloucestershire
Emma Phipps is a prominent animal activist in Gloucestershire, having been a key member of the Three Counties Hunt sabs with the infamous Lynn Sawyer since 2013.
Over her time sabbing Phipps has surrounded herself with some of the very worst sab behaviour, and been embroiled in wasting police and judicial time out of her unfounded hatred for legal trail hunts in the Gloucestershire area.
Elaine Barnett Case
During a trail hunting meet in February 2016, Ledbury Hunt member Mark Melladay was accused of assault by battery by one of Phipps’ Three Counties sab brigade, Elaine Barnett.
Cheltenham Magistrates Court heard Barnett had allegedly been trying to distract the hounds by whipping the road during a legal trail hunt. Her reckless actions no doubt endangered the hounds, despite her profressed love for animals.
Mr Melladay, who was filmed riding his horse in Barnett’s direction, naturally followed his distracted hounds through a break in the hedgerow and tracked Ms Barnett across the road and into a thicket. The court ruled there was no evidence of any contact and, thus, no evidence of assault by battery (or any form of assault for that matter).
Following a similar occurrence a few months earlier – where huntsman Peter Doggrell was swiftly cleared of maliciously inflicting bodily harm – the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) came under scrutiny for allegedly caving in to pressure from animal rights campaigners too easily.
It is clear that Mr Melladay should never have come to court.
According to The Times, the police who investigated the videos in both cases decided to take no further action, however the CPS brought prosecutions after the videos were re-examined under the victims' right to review.
Tim Bonner from the Countryside Alliance accused the CPS of bending to mob rule.
He told The Times: "It is very worrying that there appears to be an increasing number of cases where charging decisions are made on the basis of who can shout the loudest, not the quality of the evidence provided by the complainant.”
But this still didn’t match Phipps’ twisted version of reality, who filmed the footage of Mr Melladay riding towards Barnett.
“We didn't think it was going to go anywhere. If we had had any say in it all, there's no way we'd have pushed for [assault by battery] when there would be much more of a chance of getting a prosecution for common assault. He definitely should have gone to court. What he did was wrong,” she said.
A denial of reality is commonplace amongst hunt saboteurs. Phipps’ denial of (her own) evidence is no different to the saboteurs’ wider denial that Mel Broughton is an extremist or that Paul Allman is a criminal.
Accomplice of Lynn Sawyer
Speaking at the Cheltenham Badger Cull Protest in 2016, Phipps recalls nostalgically how in the summer of 2013 she went to visit activist Lynn Sawyer in Gloucestershire for two weeks and never left.
Inducted by Sawyer, Phipps remains on a self-righteous crusade against badger culling across Gloucestershire.
Sawyer helped orchestrate a number of criminal campaigns over the last thirty years. In 1999, she was one of the instigators of the Stop Huntington Animal Cruelty (SHAC) campaign against Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS), which lasted until 2014. SHAC was officially registered to Sawyer’s house in Evesham, Worcestershire.
SHAC's crusade was described by one judge as a "ruthless and sustained campaign" against the HLS scientists, who were carrying out life-saving research at the institute in Cambridgeshire. This included false allegations of child abuse, sending hoax bombs, and delivering sanitary towels allegedly contaminated with the AIDS virus to traumatise staff.
Sawyer and her team’s campaign was so violent that it included the planting of both fake and real explosive devices into the cars of scientists. Other vehicles were set on fire and windows were smashed.
In one instance HLS managing director Brian Cass was severely beaten outside his home by three masked sabs using axe handles, among whom was extremist David Blenkinsop. In a separate incident, the company’s marketing director Andrew Gray was attacked with a chemical spray to his eyes and beaten.
Several extremists involved in SHAC served jail time.
Sawyer is currently thought to be renting out her property in Evesham whilst living rent free at the Vale Wildlife Centre in Tewkesbury, a charity which is said to be making more than £55,000 a month.
Phipps also appears to have played a role in Sawyer's violent campaign. She allegedly plead guilty along with Anton Gijsen to Aggravated Tresspass for her actions during the SHAC from 2011-2012.
Hateful Reviews & Crowdfunding
Phipps is also partial to leaving the odd spiteful review of any institution she disagrees with. One such example is her slanderous Facebook review of Cleeve Common, merely for its support and facilitation of trail hunting.
The only liar here is Phipps, whose claims about Cleeve Common are baseless and nothing more than the ideological polemics of a frustrated keyboard warrior throwing her toys out the pram.
Her other past-time is taking money off the hardworking public, as evidenced by her gofundme page from 2015 which attempts to (unsuccessfully) raise money for a saboteur tour to Malta.
“A group of Hunt Saboteurs are hoping to make it over to Malta again for a second year to help the Campaign Against Bird Slaughter, who are active in France, Italy, Malta, Cyprus, Germany and Spain along with local conservationists. We are currently trying to forge networks with other groups globally and try to learn from the way they work and bring our own skills to their campaigns. The CABS group work closely with local police forces in order to enforce bans and convict illegal trappers and shooters - very different to how we usually have to operate in the UK! Help us get out there and help build a stronger global network?”
A brass-necked effort by Phipps and Sawyer to take a nice holiday to Valetta. But if this cause is so important to them, you’d have thought they’d be able to book their own flights, which start at only £22 according to RyanAir. But paying for things themselves wouldn’t be the makeup of true hunt sabs…
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