Eco-warrior says she has been victim of witch hunt after ‘liberating’ lobster from Michelin restaurant

An animal rights campaigner has said she was the victim of a ‘witch hunt’ after accidentally killing a crayfish by ‘liberating’ it.

Emma Smart, 47, grabbed a freshwater crayfish from a tank in Catch at the Old Fish Market in Weymouth, Dorset, to place it into the harbour waters. 

But the crustacean, Ronnie, wasn’t on the menu and likely died when it was dropped into the cold ocean waters in April 2025, the eaterie owner said.

Sean Cooper added that the crayfish’s tankmate, Reggie, died of ‘loneliness’ shortly after.

Smart was convicted of criminal damage, handed a restraining order for the restaurant and an eight-month conditional discharge – she could walk free if she met certain requirements – earlier this month.

The marine biologist wrote on Facebook yesterday: ‘They call it “criminal damage.” I call it a crustacean jailbreak.’

Smart said she did the ‘act of kindness’ at a time when she was suffering a mental health crisis due to workplace bullying.

‘What followed was a truly bizarre “witch-hunt” – a weird, ego-driven vendetta enabled by a system that is, naturally, designed to protect the delicate feelings of old, white, wealthy, influential men,’ she said.

‘I had my flat raided by four Dorset Police officers in three vehicles, a search warrant, arrest warrant, stripped naked and searched, held for 12 hours in custody, five ridiculous “trumped-up from above” charges and a year of a ridiculous legal process.’

The creature that Smart yanked out of the tank had been kept as a pet for ‘educational reasons’ by Cooper, he said.

Cooper previously told the BBC he had kept the crayfish for two years so children dining at the Michelin Guide seafood restaurant could see them grow, given they aren’t native to Dorset.

To lose the crayfish was ‘distressing’, he said, and called Smart ‘ignorant’.

Smart, who has a species of fish named after her, called Cooper’s response a £13,000 ‘legal tantrum’.

‘What a selfless “Community Champion” – forcing the public to pay for his therapy-by-litigation while he hawks £95 tasting menus to a town that can barely afford the bus fare,’ she said.

‘Obviously, it’s not like this is a micro-example of a global epidemic where influential men weaponise the police, courts, mainstream media (even their own young, female staff) to protect their fragile egos. That would be a wild coincidence.’

She added: ‘I suppose in his world, the “real” criminal damage isn’t a business model that relies on systematically removing marine wildlife from a dying ocean to kill, cook, and profit from it- it’s the moment someone dares to give one of them their life back.’

Lobsters and crayfish are often used interchangeably, but both are separate species.

Extinction Rebellion added on Facebook that the crustacean was a spiny lobster, not a crayfish, and likely would have lived.

The movement’s Totnes branch said: ‘Always two sides to a story.’

The spiny lobster, sometimes called crayfish, is a solitary sea dweller being pushed to the brink of extinction amid climate change and overfishing.

They are sometimes dropped alive and conscious into boiling water to cook them, a practice that will soon be banned.

Campaigners say lobsters should be killed by a more rapid method, such as zapping the animal with electricity to kill it instantly, called stunning.

Dorset Police told Metro that a ‘proportionate investigation was carried out’.

Sentencing her, Honour Judge Susan Evans said: ‘The lobster was not there for consumption. It was there for educational purposes.

‘You were determined to take it from the tank and you placed it in the harbour.

‘It was a deeply misguided thing to have done.

‘It was not a good thing for the lobster at all and whether or not it survived, we don’t know.’

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