
Iain Dale 7pm - 10pm
9 May 2025, 10:49 | Updated: 9 May 2025, 13:01
Two men have been found guilty at Newcastle Crown Court of cutting down the Sycamore Gap tree in Northumberland.
Groundworker Daniel Graham, 39, and mechanic Adam Carruthers, 32, both denied two counts each of causing criminal damage to the tree, valued at £620,000, which stood beside Hadrian’s Wall until it was felled in September 2023.
The pair were found guilty after the jury in the trial of the two former friends was sent out to deliberate for a second day.
Jurors were first sent out around midday on Thursday and returned to Newcastle Crown Court to continue on Friday morning.
When she gave jurors their final instructions, Mrs Justice Lambert said they were under no pressure of time.
She told them: “It takes as long as it takes.”
The judge added: “The only verdict which I can accept from you is a unanimous verdict for both defendants, on both counts.”
Prosecutors said the pair travelled to the Northumberland landmark in the pitch black during Storm Agnes and used a chainsaw to fell the sycamore, which then crashed on to the Roman wall.
Read more: Sycamore Gap accused tells jurors friend 'confessed' to cutting down 'most famous tree in world'
The men drove for 40 minutes from the Carlisle area during Storm Agnes and cut down the tree in the pitch black, with one of them filming the destruction on a phone, the prosecutors added.
They then took a wedge from the tree as a trophy which has never been recovered, the court heard.
The tree also damaged the Roman wall when it crashed down on to it.
Richard Wright KC, prosecuting, said felling the tree had caused sadness and anger up and down the country.
He added that the two defendants “must have thought that this was going to be a bit of a laugh”.
"They soon realised the public reaction was one of outrage “and that far from being the big men they thought they were, everyone else thought that they were rather pathetic”, Mr Wright said.
He added: “Owning up to this arboreal equivalent of mindless thuggery would make them public enemy number one. And neither of them has got the courage to do that.”
The prosecution had previously described the technique the two men used shows "a determined, deliberate approach to the felling”.
It was described as a “moronic mission”which saw them film what they were doing on Graham’s mobile phone.
Carruthers claimed he was staying at home in his caravan with his partner and their newborn baby.
Graham claimed he was at his home that night and while he accepted his Range Rover was driven to the car park nearest to Sycamore Gap and his phone was used to film the tree being felled, he said his co-accused took both.
In his closing speech, Chris Knox, for Graham, said the defendants had fallen out “spectacularly”.He said Graham was accused of being “stroppy” when answering the prosecution’s questions.
“Does that make him the Sycamore Gap tree murderer?” Mr Knox asked the jury.“Or does it mean exactly what he said in his interviews with the police – he has been dropped in this?”
Andrew Gurney, defending Carruthers, said Graham had “named Adam Carruthers because he needs a scapegoat”.
He said Carruthers was in the dock “not because he was found at the scene… but because of Daniel Graham’s mobile phone and the words of one man – Daniel Graham, who, having found himself in the dock, has reached desperately for a lifeline and tried to throw Adam Carruthers under the bus to save his own skin”.
Mr Gurney said: “Adam Carruthers was not creeping about a national park in the dead of night.
“He was at home with his partner.”