Ferry not guilty of charges

Friday 1st May 2009, 11:09AM BST.

Shropshire huntmaster Otis Ferry has been cleared of charges of “witness nobbling” which saw him held in custody for four months.

Ferry, 26, the son of Roxy Music singer Bryan Ferry, was found not guilty of two counts of perverting the course of justice – witness intimidation – by a judge at Gloucester Crown Court yesterday.

Ferry, of Eaton Mascott, near Shrewsbury, had been accused of telling his former groom David Hodgkiss not to give evidence against him in a forthcoming trial.

That trial, in which Ferry is alleged to have robbed hunt monitors Helen Ghalmi and Susan Grima of a video camera and keys, was delayed in September last year when the tampering allegations surfaced.

Ferry, joint master of the South Shropshire Hunt, was subsequently charged with two counts of perverting the course of justice. But prosecutor Kerry Barker told the court the prosecution was formally offering no evidence. The robbery was alleged to have taken place in November 2007.

View more: Shrewsbury news, South Shropshire news.