Two friends who embarked on a “moronic mission” to fell the Sycamore Gap tree with a chainsaw have been found guilty of “mindless” criminal damage.
Daniel Graham, 39, and Adam Carruthers, 32, cut down the cherished tree, next to Hadrian’s Wall in Northumberland, as Storm Agnes raged in the early hours of 28 September 2023.
They saw it as a “bit of a laugh” and afterwards “revelled” in their infamy as the crime made headlines around the world, a jury was told. They thought themselves “big or funny or clever”.
Neither Graham nor Carruthers showed any visible emotion as guilty verdicts were delivered on Friday morning. It took the jury five hours to reach the unanimous verdicts.
The judge, Mrs Justice Lambert, said she would pass sentence on 15 July, by which time pre-sentence reports would be ready. Remanding both men into custody she said they could face “a lengthy period in custody”.
After the verdict, the Woodland Trust called on the government to bring in new legislation to ensure important trees are listed for protection like historic buildings are.
Both men denied charges of criminally damaging the tree and the wall it stood beside, a Unesco world heritage site.
They said they were at their homes in Cumbria at the time of the felling.
This was despite evidence showing that Graham’s car and phone were used in the crime. Both men had footage of the felling on their phones. The court heard they later exchanged messages about the headlines being generated by the felling.
The pair were found guilty after an eight-day trial at Newcastle crown court.
The prosecutor Richard Wright KC said the crime was a “moronic mission” and the “arboreal equivalent of mindless thuggery”, and that the pair showed a “basic lack of decency and courage to own up to what they did”.
He said: “Up and down the country and across the world, the reaction of all right-thinking people to the senseless felling of the Sycamore Gap tree has been one of sadness and anger. Who would do such a thing? Why would anyone do such a thing? Take something beautiful and destroy it for no good reason.”
He said the “public indignation, anger and downright disgust” at the felling had been palpable. “Far from being the big men they thought they were, everyone else thought that they were rather pathetic.”
The jury heard the pair deliberately chose a stormy night to fell the tree because strong winds make it easier to topple a big tree.
One of the men filmed the felling on Graham’s iPhone, footage that was enhanced by police and shown to the jury.
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Wright said the pair’s technique showed “expertise and a determined, deliberate approach” to their action.
A wedge of the trunk, removed as part of the felling process, was taken as “a trophy”. It has never been recovered but video footage and a photograph of it in Graham’s car boot was on his phone.
Wright said that as the world’s media began reporting on the tree’s felling, the men shared social media posts, with Graham messaging Carruthers: “Here we go.”
Graham, who ran a groundwork business near Carlisle, told the court Carruthers was responsible and must have borrowed his car and phone while he was asleep in his caravan after taking a sleeping pill.
Carruthers, a mechanic living in a caravan in Kirkbride, said he was not at the site of the crime. His barrister, Andrew Gurney, said it made no sense for a man to be “gallivanting around the national park cutting down Sycamore Gap” just five days after his partner had left hospital with their newborn baby.
The case had cast light on the need for heritage trees to have extra protection, the Woodland Trust said after the verdicts. It is calling on the government to back a private member’s bill put forward by Lady Young in the House of Lords that would allow for the listing of heritage trees.
The trust’s head of campaigns, Adam Cormack, said the proposed law would provide “a consistent level of protection, conservation and active stewardship” for several thousand of the most important trees across England.
The National Trust, which owns the land at Sycamore Gap, said it was focused on “creating a positive legacy for the tree”. A spokesperson said: “The needless felling of the Sycamore Gap tree shocked people around the country and overseas, demonstrating the powerful connection between people and our natural heritage.
“It was felt particularly deeply here in the north east of England where the tree was an emblem of the region and the backdrop to many personal memories.”
Supt Kevin Waring of Northumbria police said: “We often hear references made to mindless acts of vandalism – but that term has never been more relevant than today in describing the actions of those individuals. At no point have the two men given an explanation for why they targeted the tree – and there never could be a justifiable one.”