In reply to Solsbury: As I said I generally don't comment on UKC on anything other than climbing as there is seldom easy answers. Community service can be very tough and intrusive so is not necessarily an easy option, if he only gets two hours a week his sentence will extend far longer than any prison sentence.
He had an employer, they presumedly chose him in part for his reputation of managing shoots, what he was doing must have been known. This is in some ways what makes it significantly different from saying transgressions in say the NHS or a private company such as the railways where generally speaking workers crimes at work would not be known about or sanctioned.
Do shoots need licences? Take it away, I know the company will probably file for bankruptcy and the just reappear but....
I was just shocked, wow, by the sheer relentless destructive callousness of this particular crime, though there are of course plenty of others far closer to home as I know from my daily work.