Claire Bellamy

Introduction

Claire Bellamy is a 51-year-old Scottish shepherd who served as Master of the Lauderdale Foxhunt and who was convicted after trial of deliberately hunting a fox using dogs, an offence under section 1(1) of the Hunting with Dogs (Scotland) Act 2023 . At her sentencing on 10 November 2026, Sheriff Gill told her the evidence against her had been “overwhelming”, sentenced her to the maximum 300 hours of unpaid work as a direct alternative to custody, and imposed a ten-year disqualification order banning her from keeping dogs, with an exception written in only for a terrier and collie dogs . The court heard she has since resigned from the role of Master of the Lauderdale Foxhunt and no longer has any hounds, making her one of the most prominent figures to be convicted under Scotland’s hunting ban since it came into force .

Background Information

Bellamy worked as a shepherd and had no previous convictions before the case, facts the sheriff took into account alongside a report assessing her as being at low risk of re-offending . She had, by the sheriff’s own count in court, conducted around 1,500 hunts during her time leading the Lauderdale Foxhunt, a traditional mounted hunt operating with hounds in the Scottish Borders . Much was made at trial of who held the hunt’s licence under the new legislation, but Sheriff Gill dismissed that line of argument as “a red herring”, noting it was agreed in a joint minute of agreement that the licence did not include Bellamy as a permitted named assistant . The case was brought under the 2023 Act, which outlawed the deliberate hunting of wild mammals with dogs in Scotland and replaced the looser rules that had previously allowed so-called trail hunting to continue .

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Convicted at trial of hunting a fox with dogs; disqualified from keeping dogs for ten years.

The prosecution’s central evidence was a recording made by a witness, Andrew Davies, of a fox being chased by multiple hounds, which Sheriff Gill described as “particularly harrowing to watch” . Davies and a second witness, Elizabeth McLauglin, gave evidence at the trial, and the sheriff commended both of them for it . Bellamy’s defence throughout the trial was that she had not deliberately hunted the fox, but the sheriff ruled that this was “not borne out by your behaviour and actions”, which he found clearly showed deliberate hunting . In remarks after the trial he addressed her complaint that she was “being made an example of”, noting that she had told a social worker she did not agree with the legislation because it makes hunting foxes more difficult . “Ms Bellamy, that is the purpose of the legislation,” he told her in court. “What you don’t understand is that the law is the law, and you are bound by the law” .

Public Reaction and Consequences

The conviction and the sheriff’s unusually direct public remarks drew a clear line between traditional hunting practice and the criminal law as it now stands in Scotland, with the court stating plainly that disagreement with the statute is no defence to breaking it . The consequences landed on Bellamy personally: she stood down from the mastership of the hunt she had led and disposed of her hounds by the time of sentencing, and she now carries a ten-year disqualification from keeping dogs that carves out only working terrier and collie breeds for her shepherd work . The unpaid-work order was imposed as a direct alternative to custody at the maximum the court could give, with Sheriff Gill warning her that any breach would bring the matter back before him and “you may very well receive a custodial sentence” . He weighed the presumption against short custodial sentences and the community-based alternatives open to him before settling on the combination of unpaid work and disqualification .

Current Status

Bellamy was sentenced on 10 November 2026 to 300 hours of unpaid work, to be completed within twelve months, together with the ten-year disqualification order under section 22(2) of the 2023 Act . The disqualification covers all the subsections of that provision except for a terrier dog and collie dogs, preserving her ability to keep working dogs for her employment as a shepherd . She resigned from the Mastership of the Lauderdale Foxhunt and no longer keeps hounds, and no appeal against the conviction or sentence was reported in the published remarks .

Impact on Their Career/Life

A first offender at 51, Bellamy left court with a criminal conviction for a hunting offence, a maximum community payback requirement on her record, and a decade-long ban on keeping dogs other than terriers and collies, effectively ending any return to mounted hunting leadership . The sheriff’s public framing — that the 2023 Act exists precisely to make hunting foxes with dogs harder, and that a hunt master of some 1,500 hunts’ experience could not claim ignorance of it — turned her case into a reference point for how Scotland’s courts treat organised hunting under the new law . Her resignation from the Lauderdale Foxhunt removed the role she held when the offence was filmed, and the disqualification order means that even her private life with animals is now legally restricted for ten years .

Sources

• “PF v Claire Bellamy, sentencing remarks of Sheriff Gill” — Judiciary of Scotland, 10 November 2026: source