A GP jailed after sabotaging petrol pumps for Just Stop Oil (JSO) said he had “no greater duty as a doctor” than climate protest.
Dr Patrick Hart, 38, caused thousands of pounds of damage to petrol pumps at an M25 service station by smashing them with a hammer and chisel and spraying them with orange paint.
This week, at Chelmsford Crown Court, the Bristol-based GP was sentenced to 12 months in prison after being found guilty of causing criminal damage.
In total, 16 fuel pumps at Thurrock motorway services, in Grays, Essex, were damaged by Hart on Aug 24 2022.
The damage was caused after five climate activists, including Hart, breached a High Court injunction by blocking access to the M25 petrol station on 24 August by sitting on the road.
Essex County Council said the cost of repairing the pumps was £9,376.27.
The forecourt was not fully operational until 18:00 BST the next day and the temporary closure led to lost profits of £1,146.06, the court heard.
Hart had previously faced civil charges and has been fined over the same incident as the Thurrock Esso petrol station is subject to a private injunction.
When he is released, Dr Patrick Hart will face a tribunal after being referred for a disciplinary hearing by his medical regulator – PA/Jordan Pettitt
When he is released from prison, Hart will face a tribunal after being referred for a disciplinary hearing by his medical regulator, the General Medical Council.
A spokesman for the GMC said Hart was not currently suspended.
Before he was sentenced, Hart told the court: “Right now, the greatest health threat to all of us is the unfolding climate catastrophe.
“It is the greatest health threat we have ever faced. All healthcare workers have a responsibility to protect the health of their patients.
“If we do not stand up to the oil and gas executives who are wreaking havoc on our climate and the politicians who enable them, if we do not end the burning of fossil fuels, then we will have failed as a profession and the health systems that we have developed over centuries will collapse.
“I will continue to fight against the death sentence of fossil fuels for as long as I have strength in me. I have no greater duty as a doctor at this moment in history.”
Stormed the pitch
Hart has been acquitted at court on three previous occasions and was also handed a suspended sentence for other climate protest action.
In June last year, he and Samuel Johnson, 41, were found not guilty of criminal damage after they stormed the pitch during a rugby final in May 2023 and covered it with orange cornstarch powder.
On that occasion, JSO claimed prosecutors struggled to prove they had intended to cause criminal damage because they would not have realised how difficult it would be to clean the substance from the specialist pitch.
Similar powder paint was used during the Ashes at Lords and was easily cleaned up with a leaf blower, but the hybrid pitch at Twickenham is a combination of natural and plastic grass and much more difficult to clean, the campaign group said.
Another JSO protester, Sarah Benn, a retired Birmingham GP, had her medical licence suspended for five months in April last year.
She was jailed for 32 days for breaching a private injunction by protesting on a grass verge and sitting on a private road at Kingsbury oil terminal in 2022.