District Judge Bone said he had drawn an adverse inference from the fact that all four defendants had refused to name or failed to identify a man who had climbed a fence to retrieve the carcass of the fox killed in a family garden in Hingham.
However, he dismissed all charges against the joint masters of the hunt, Mr Kendall and Mr Gurney.
He also dismissed charges of criminal damage and said it had not been proven the dogs were dangerously out of control.
But he said the illegal hunting charge against Bell and Eggington had been proven beyond reasonable doubt on February 8 and 20.
He said Bell, who is married with two children, and Egginton knew there was a fox and almost immediately turned the dogs in its direction.
“I just don’t see how they couldn’t see the fox,” he added.
Of the Hingham incident, he said: “What the dogs did on that terrace was absolutely distasteful and Bell and Egginton will be held criminally responsible.”
