Sycamore Gap pair jailed for more than 4 years as judge slams 'mindless' thugs

The two men who mounted a "moronic mission" to cut down the much-loved Sycamore Gap tree have been jailed for a total of eight and a half years.

Daniel Graham, 39, and accomplice Adam Carruthers, 32, chopped down the tree in what they claimed was an "act of drunken stupidity".

Appearing before Newcastle Crown Court this afternoon Carruthers was handed a four-year and three months sentence whilst Graham received the same jail term from Mrs Justice Lambert.

The court was told the felling of the near 200-year-old tree took "just two or three minutes" and the judge said she was sure Carruthers had been responsible for wielding the chain saw whilst Graham assisted by "driving, encouraging and not least filming" the event. But she insisted both were "equally culpable".

Graham, 39, and accomplice Carruthers, 32, had been kept in custody "for their own protection" by a judge ahead of today's sentencing hearing after being convicted of two counts of criminal damage each following a two -week trial in May.

The jury had taken took just five hours to unanimously find the pair guilty of damaging both the Northumberland tree and Hadrian's Wall when the trunk fell on it in September 2023.

The tree's value was initially assessed as £622,191, while damage to Hadrian's Wall was calculated to be £1,144.

Richard Wright KC, prosecuting, said the value of the tree has been disputed, and that the lowest figure the Crown would agree with was £458,000.

Mrs Justice Lambert said she had seen a number of expert valuations and the main point, when it came to sentencing, was that it was worth more than £5,000.

Mr Wright said that in their pre-sentence reports both defendants "now appear to have admitted their role in felling the tree, in the sense they both admit they went on the mission".

He told the court they denied intending for the tree to be cut down, either saying they were intoxicated or that they "didn't believe it would happen until it did".

Mr Wright added: "The prosecution rejects these late admissions... The court can be sure they were sober and prepared to do what they did."

He said one of the aggravating factors was the site's heritage status and the defendants' attempts to avoid detection.

Mr Wright said they knew other people, including a young boy, had been arrested in connection with the offence and were "closely following (the investigation) when they knew they were responsible".

He added that there was a "high degree of planning and premeditation" telling Newcastle Crown Court: "This was an expedition which required significant planning in terms of taking a vehicle, driving for about 40 minutes to a car park, taking with them appropriate specialist equipment, carrying the equipment for about 20 minutes' walk in each direction.

"The felling was carried out in a deliberate, professional way."

He said the night was selected because of the weather, and Daniel Graham had said during the trial it was easier to fell a tree in high winds.

Andrew Poad, a National Trust manager, submitted a moving victim impact statement that described the "iconic tree" as "totemic" but could never be replaced.

He added: "Whilst the National Trust has cared for it on behalf of the nation, it belonged to the people. An overwhelming sense of loss and confusion was felt across the world.

During her sentencing remarks, Mrs Justice Lambert said she could now be sure that Adam Carruthers cut the Sycamore Gap tree down while Daniel Graham filmed him, after admissions they had both made in pre-sentence reports.

She told the defendants: "At the trial in May neither of you accepted any involvement.

"In recent interviews with the Probation Service, although seeking to minimise your culpability, you admitted being present and involved.

"I can now be sure you, Adam Carruthers, were the person who felled the tree and you, Daniel Graham, assisted and encouraged him by driving there and back and not least by filming it on your phone."

But she added the defendants' motivation for felling the tree remained unclear.

She told them: "Adam Carruthers, you told a probation officer you had no idea why you carried out the crime and could offer no explanation.

"You said you had drunk a bottle of whisky after a tough day and everything was a blur.

"Daniel Graham, as during the trial, your main focus seemed to be to heap as much blame as possible on your co-defendant.

"You now accept you were present but blame him for what happened that night."

The judge went on to say: "You told the probation officer it was '(Carruthers') dream and his show' and you just went along with it."

"Although there may be grains of truth in what you said, I do not accept your explanations are wholly honest or the whole story.

"Adam Carruthers, your account that you had so much to drink that you had no memory of what happened is not plausible.

"The tree felling demonstrated skill and required deliberate and co-ordinated actions by you... It was not the work of someone whose actions were significantly impaired through drink.

"Nor, Daniel Graham, do I accept you just went along with your co-defendant. You filmed the whole event, you took photos of the chainsaw and wedge of trunk in the boot of your Range Rover.

"The next day, you appeared to revel in coverage of your actions in the media.

"This is not the behaviour of someone who is shocked and horrified by what has happened."

Mrs Justice Lambert said one of the main reasons for the offence on Hadrian's Wall appeared to be "sheer bravado".

She told the defendants: "Felling the tree in the middle of the night in a storm gave you some sort of thrill.

"You revelled in the coverage, taking pride in what you have done, knowing you were responsible for the crime so many people were talking about.

"Whether that was the sole explanation for what you did, I do not know, however I know you are both equally culpable."

The judge said the tree had become a "place of special personal significance where marriages were proposed and tributes to loved ones were left".

She added: "It was a place of peace and tranquility to which people returned again and again."

The judge said there had been "an extraordinary social impact" to the offence and that it had caused "widespread distress".

"The question was why anyone would do this to such a beautiful tree in such a special place.

"It was beyond comprehension."

Mr Poad revealed the cost of removing the tree was £30,000, with £20,000 to be spent on the site in 2025, all paid for from charitable funds.

He said an email address set up within days of the felling for people to share thoughts received 600 responses in under a month.

Comments included one from a person in Australia saying they had only seen it in photos but were "shocked and heartbroken at the sight of this magnificent tree being felled in such a brutal way".

Another said: "My husband proposed to me at Sycamore Gap under its leafy shelter. A few years ago after lockdown we took our children to see and walk the same section of the wall.

"I'm so glad we got to share such a beautiful and special spot with them before it was gone."

A further response said: "A simply iconic part of our North East heritage, representing strength and longevity."

The court was shown pictures of the new Sycamore Gap Celebration Room at The Sill site in Northumberland, and some comments left by people on a board and in the visitors' book.

One said: "Nature at its best over 300 years, humanity at its worst over one night."

The court head Graham had two previous convictions for battery in 2007 and 2016 and two public order offences in 2021 and 2022.

He said the offences were "all relationship-based" but none had resulted in a prison term.

Graham also had a caution for theft when he cut up logs using a chainsaw and made off with them.

Carruthers meanwhile has no previous convictions, arrests, reprimands or warnings.

Chris Knox, defending Graham, called him "a troubled man who has had very real difficulties in his life, which have not all been of his own making."

He said the groundworker had set up a "proper business which paid tax and did all the appropriate things" but his home and business had been attacked following his conviction.

Andrew Gurney, for Carruthers, said he played an active role in bringing up his children, aged six and two but being in prison since May had been "torture" for him as he had never been away from his children for so long.

He said: "It is his stupid actions that have caused him to be taken away from his family and his children. Mr Carruthers is someone who is going to have to bear the burden of what he has done for the rest of his life. "He is a man of previous good character. That is gone.

"He will forever be linked to this act. He will have to carry this as some form of personal penance."

Mr Gurney said his client had finally offered a motive for chopping down the tree in his Pre-Sentence Report becuase he "wishes to cleanse his conscience of what he has done."

He added: "People want to know 'Why? Why did you conduct this mindless act?'

"Unfortunately, it is no more than drunken stupidity.

"He felled that tree and it is something he will regret for the rest of his life. There's no better explanation than that."

Mr Gurney said Carruthers was a good father, a hard-worker and hitherto, was of good character.

This act of criminal damage was "anathema" to him, Mr Gurney said.

"That is not the sort of person he is, or wants to be," he said.

"He does wish to make good on that on his release. He hopes, by his actions moving forward, he can repay what he has done, in some way."

Prosecutors told how the "odd couple" did everything together and thought it would be "a bit of a laugh". But they realised they "weren't the big men they thought they were" when faced with the public outrage at their "arboreal equivalent of mindless thuggery".

One of them felled the iconic tree while the other filmed it on a phone. It took them less than three minutes to destroy the 15m-tall sycamore - which was planted in a dip next to Hadrian's Wall in the late 1800s. It crashed on to the Roman landmark.

Newcastle Crown Court heard that groundworker Graham and mechanic Carruthers kept a wedge of the trunk as a trophy but it has never been found. They spent the next day "revelling" in news reports about their criminality but then fell out "spectacularly" and blamed each other when they realised they would be "public enemy number one", said prosecutor Richard Wright KC.

Graham told the court he was at his home that night and that Carruthers had taken his Range Rover and phone to Sycamore Gap.

Carruthers claimed he was at home with his partner and their baby. He also said he could not understand the public outcry as it was "just a tree".

The men had barely reacted as they were found guilty of causing £622,191 of criminal damage to the tree and £1,144 to the wall.

The pair had both lived on the margins of society, each living in a caravan on ramshackle compounds near Carlisle.

Graham was described by neighbours as a friendless recluse. He set up a smallholding in a picturesque and well-heeled village and spent years at loggerheads with locals over the noise of his dogs, the constant flow of lorries used in his groundwork business and the prefab buildings he erected without permission.

He goaded them further by calling his yard Millbeck Stables - the name of the mansion across the road owned by former Carlisle Utd chairman Fred Story.

A neighbour in Grinsdale Bridge said: "Daniel is a sociopath and a bully. Every reasonable complaint he received about this monstrosity he built was met with threats and aggression. I feel certain he was the driving force behind what happened at Sycamore Gap. Adam doesn't have the brains to plan such a thing."

Even Graham's grandmother Joan, 86, didn't have a good word to say.

She admitted: "He hasn't been part of my life for a few years and I'm happy for it to stay that way. I don't think he'll cope well in jail but that's his own fault."

She said they fell out at the funeral of Graham's dad when Joan told him she did not like the way his new girlfriend was behaving towards her.

Joan's refuse worker son Michael had been the one constant in Graham's life after his mother left. When she began a new relationship Michael's mental health deteriorated and he tragically hanged himself in Joan's loft in June 2021.

A former neighbour of Graham said: "He was close to his dad and took it hard when he lost him. He just seemed to lose his way." Joan said: "The last words he spoke to me were this time last year. I was crossing the road and he pipped his horn and he shouted, 'Hey, you, f*** off.'

"He's well out of my life."

Mechanic Carruthers, 32, was described by a former neighbour in Wigton as "a bit of an idiot."

He came to know Graham from working on his dad's treasured Land Rover Defender so it could be used in the funeral cortege.

At the time of the felling Carruthers was living with his partner and their daughters, a newborn and a toddler, in a caravan at the Old Fuel Depot on Kirkbride airfield. As he and Graham drove home with the trophy tree wedge in the boot, she sent him a video of their daughter taking a bottle.

Carruthers replied: "I have a better video than that."

Following his conviction she said: "I've nothing to say."

A National Trust spokesperson said: "As the investigation into the felling of the Sycamore Gap tree concludes, we are deeply grateful for the thousands of messages of support received from around the world over the past 18 months.

"The enduring sense of loss reflects the powerful bond between people and our natural heritage.

"In partnership with Northumberland National Park, we're proud to return a large section of the trunk to The Sill: Landscape Discovery Centre, offering a space for reflection and reconnection.

"This winter, 49 'Trees of Hope' grown from seeds from the original sycamore will be planted in communities across the UK, extending the tree's legacy.

"The Sycamore Gap tree was iconic and represented thousands of cherished trees across the country that benefit people, nature, and climate. We remain committed to working with partners to secure stronger protections for these irreplaceable natural treasures."

Adam Cormack, head of campaigning for the Woodland Trust said: "This sentence sends a clear message that gratuitous damage and destruction of trees is unacceptable.

"The consequences of the felling of this iconic tree are tragic for nature, for our cultural heritage and for these two men and their families.

"To prevent this from happening again we must recognise how strongly the public feel about trees being vital to our communities, and respond by improving legal protections for our most special and important trees.

"In response to the felling, the Government commissioned a Tree Council and Forest Research review of the protection of important trees which was published in April.

"We urge the Government to take forward the recommendations of this report."