AN anti-fracking protester has been acquitted for the second time of breaking the law during demonstrations outside the Third Energy site at Kirby Misperton.

Alex Geoffrey Cohen, 30, faced three trials. He was convicted of two offences at the second and found not guilty of all charges at the first and third trials. He had denied all charges.

All the charges related to incidents during the months-long campaign against Third Energy’s operation off Habton Road, Kirby Misperton.

Natalie Simone Morris, 37, of Nunnings Lane, Nafferton, East Yorkshire, and Alec Geoffrey Cohen, 30, of Moss Farm Lane, Blackpool, both denied obstructing Habton Road, Kirby Misperton, on October 23, and were acquitted at the end of her first trial and his third trial.

On May 18, Cohen was acquitted of hindering Third Energy’s activities by scaling a rig on the site and remaining there for 30 hours through a major storm, and of criminal damage to the site’s perimeter fence.

Cohen was conditionally discharged for 12 months and ordered to pay £85 prosecution costs and a £20 statutory surcharge for obstructing the highway in Habton Road, Kirby Misperton, near the Third Energy site on October 27 and remaining on a lorry illegally to stage a protest on Barton Hill on the A64 on October 26. He was convicted of both offences at a trial in June.

All the trials were at York Magistrates' Court.