Pest controllers poisoned wildlife

Terrence Webb, 28, and Mark Page, 35, were responsible for the deaths of 90 birds and a pet dog at a beauty spot in Wanstead Flats, east London.

The former Newham Council employees used bread laced with a deadly pesticide to kill birds and a pet dog at Alexandra Lake. The pair fed the toxic chemical used to kill cockroaches, fleas and bed bugs to birds over two days, boasting of what they had done to colleagues.

Experts said their reckless actions also put children playing around the lake in danger of being poisoned.

A Metropolitan Police spokesman said Webb and Page were jailed for four months and fined £7,000 each at Snaresbrook Crown Court.

The outbreak of animal deaths at the lake in March sparked a public health scare as police and wildlife officers sealed off the area for three weeks. At least 90 birds, including geese, moor hens, ducks and coot, as well as a pet German Shepherd, were killed.

Investigators discovered the two pest controllers had spent their lunch breaks at the lake on March 8 and 9.They baited bread with pesticide and left it on the ground before watching the animals die.

One of their first victims was a pet dog owned by a local woman who regularly walked it around the lake.

Webb, of Peregrine Road, Ilford, and Page, of White Hart Lane, Romford, admitted two counts of misuse of pesticides and two counts of theft. Charges relating to the storing of pesticide and the theft of a sprayer were dropped by the prosecution.

The two men were sacked by Newham Council once their actions came to light.