A FORMER soldier has been jailed for six years for her part in a conspiracy to blackmail an animal-testing company through a campaign of terror which involved the use of improvised explosive devices and the desecration of a grave.
Debbie Vincent, 52, was found guilty last month at Winchester Crown Court of being involved in the Europe-wide conspiracy by the Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (Shac) group against Cambridge-based Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS).
Michael Bowes, QC, prosecuting, told the jury during her trial that the protests, which targeted suppliers and customers of HLS, included falsely accusing staff members of being paedophiles and sending incendiary devices and hoax bombs.
He said the aim of the campaign was to put HLS out of business through cutting off its suppliers by creating a "climate of fear".
One target of the activists had the grave of his mother dug up and her ashes stolen.
In addition to the prison term, Judge Keith Cutler imposed a five-year anti-social behaviour order to commence on her release.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article