THANK God we have people like Michelle Bryan and Joe Hashman – the two undercover animal welfare activists who successfully filmed illegal hare-coursing on land owned by Peter Easterby, resulting in his prosecution.

This disgusting practice of releasing hares into an enclosed area and then setting dogs on them while people pay money to see them ripped apart was a countryside tradition appealing to the type of person who gains some sort of weird pleasure watching the death and injury of animals, and along with fox hunting was made illegal via the Hunting Act of 2005.

Hopefully, the police and RSPCA will now realise that individuals such as Easterby and his associate John Shaw will break the law to gain their pleasure, and will observe and monitor groups like the one which organised the event and any other rural “event” where animals are at risk of persecution.

Jonathan Charles Bonner, Huntington Road, York.