Overview
- Prosecutors at Southampton Magistrates' Court played CCTV said to show three men at Broughton Community Shop at 3:23am in March 2024.
- They told the court about 50 dead hares dumped across the forecourt, a scene staff discovered when they opened the shop the next morning.
- One man smeared hare blood on the storefront and placed a barn owl and a kestrel in the door handles, according to the prosecution.
- Investigators said James Kempster was linked by DNA on the birds, mobile phone location data, clothing seen on camera, and a car later found burned out nearby.
- Kempster, 39, of Totton, denies two counts of possessing a dead wild bird and one count of criminal damage, and prosecutors said a verdict does not require a proven motive.