Wrangle over who owns wild animals

Nov 7 2007 by Liam Murphy, Liverpool Daily Post

A UNIQUE legal case over the ownership of wild animals reared by a Wirral woman who runs a rescue centre ended unresolved yesterday.

Pat Seager agreed to the RSPCA setting free 14 wild birds – including crows and blackbirds – and hedgehogs which it had seized from her Rock Ferry home six weeks ago.

This meant the precise legal position over “ownership” of wild animals was not clarified.

A hearing at Wirral magistrates court had been arranged for the RSPCA to get permission to release the animals into the wild.

Ms Seager had effectively claimed ownership of the animals, saying she feared that because she had hand reared many of them, they would not be able to survive by themselves. Phil Wilson, the RSPCA’s prosecution case manager for the north west area, said the law was confusing and they had hoped it would be made clearer by yesterday’s application.

He said the Theft Act rules out anyone owning wild birds, but the RSPCA still needed the court to allow them to release the animals.