"there is more to this tale than meets the eye "
Well, let us see. As a financially strapped student i did not own my own property. I lived in a room in a house in which other students (studying accountancy, medicine and architecture, all professions requiring a spotless record for future employment). I lived in the same room, same house when I got my certificate. Come renewal time the police, and I am guessing this one, regarded my location as an insecure premises.
I hunted at a farm called Bury farm near Bedford. The farmer was the only one out of many I had asked who would allow me to hunt. Rabbits, pigeons and some times he would insist that I contribute to seagull cullilng. Cost was one pound per visit. And the police did ask for written proof that he would allow me to shoot there. Whether they had the legal right to do so or not is a moot point.
The guns in question were a Greener single shot, a Mossberg 410 bolt action with tubular magazine, a 9mm Glatt garden gun. Total value back then around 30 pounds. Spending hundreds, at best, to retain 30 seemed like a futile strategy. The check was for fourteen pounds.
I was not the only shotgun owner targeted by the Hornsey police. One of the refusals made it to County Court and the police were obliged to state the reason for exercising their discretionary power to refuse a certificate renewal. The case was mentioned in the Times Law Report I think. The owner had secure premises, a reason to own a shotgun, but the owner's brother who lived outside London had a criminal record and occasionally visited the applicants home, this was revealed in court as the reason for the refusal. The judge deemed it insufficient and the man retained his guns, but did bear heavy legal fees.
There was a silver lining to this cloud. It encouraged me to leave the UK, get employed by a major US multinational, marry a wonderful girl from Illinois, and eventually get into publishing a successful hunting magazine. Beats becoming a crusty London solicitor anytime.
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