A BOXER dog belonging to a former magistrate escaped a death sentence when its owner appeared in court yesterday after a sheep had been killed on farmland.

Harrogate magistrates heard how the four-year-old dog owned by Maureen Bingham, a former JP in Richmond, who now runs a business providing nursing staff and acts as an expert witness on nursing care - was spotted on part of a holding where sheep were grazing at Melbecks Moor in Swaledale.

Bingham, 46, of Hugill House, Winterings, Gunnerside, had denied two charges of being the owner of a dog which worried sheep and the case had been transferred to Harrogate because of her association with the Richmond bench.

It was listed for trial yesterday but Bingham changed her plea to guilty on one of the charges and the second was dropped.

Simon Ostler, prosecuting, said the dog had been spotted by publican Denise Clarkson on land farmed by George Hird while she was out walking with her husband Neil, on Saturday, February 23.

There was a dead sheep nearby and although another dog had been seen in the area - on the opposite side of a beck - it was the Crown's case that Bingham's dog was responsible.

In mitigation, James Staton said Bingham had gone out to the back of her house to fill coal buckets and the dog had escaped into pasture where the sheep were.

Bingham had set off to retrieve the dog in heavy snow but Mrs Clarkson had found it first. It had been an unfortunate situation but she had now agreed compensation of £100 with the farmer.

Fining Bingham £100 with £85 costs, court chairman John Metcalfe told her there were areas of concern to the Bench. While the charge was one of owning a dog which worried sheep there had been no evidence that the Boxer did worry them, only that it was in the area.

"If there was evidence of worrying our sentence would probably have been higher and the dog might have been destroyed. Ordinarily dogs that worry sheep, and their owners, are dealt with very harshly,'' he said.