A sheriff has blasted the actions of an internet daredevil who scaled the Forth Road Bridge’s 500ft suspension tower as “little short of lunacy.”
Ally Law clambered up the North Tower of the A90 bridge in the early hours of July 16 2020.
The 26-year-old’s ascent was filmed to rack up views on YouTube, a platform where has has almost 3.5m subscribers.
Law of Hepworth Close in Southampton, was convicted of breaching the peace after a trial in Fife.
Representing himself in the dock, Law denied the charge he initially faced of culpable and reckless conduct.
Law hit headlines in 2018 when he and another broke into the Celebrity Big Brother House and he is banned from all UK theme parks after breaking into Thorpe Park to scale rollercoasters at night.
Two years ago, Law posted a video outlining his entire criminal history.
Trial
In Dunfermline Sheriff Court, the Crown’s entire case was agreed beforehand and Sheriff Charles Macnair KC was shown YouTube footage of Law and others scaling and descending the bridge.
A joint minute of agreement outlined police were called to the span at 4.45am on the Thursday morning after receiving a report males had scaled the North Tower and were making their way back down.
The group, initially spotted by men in a repair van, were arrested by police shortly after returning to the ground.
Fiscal depute Michael Robertson said Law was endangering anyone on the bridge below but the YouTuber said they had chosen the early morning to climb as there was no traffic and one lane was closed for repairs.
Sheriff Macnair KC noted: “This is the bridge effectively only used by buses and HGVs.
“For most of the time, if he fell it wouldn’t be on to the roadway.
“He would go down into the Forth.
“The way that its designed is, you’ve got the footpath, then there’s the gap which has the suspension and then you have the roadway.
“If you fell from the suspension then you’d go down between the two.”
“Fit and healthy”
Lawyer-less Law told the court he was an able climber with more than a decade of experience.
“If we would have fallen, we would have fallen on to the empty side.
“We’re not looking to endanger anyone’s lives.
“We weren’t acting recklessly, I don’t believe.
“There wasn’t any members of the public on (the bridge).
“We didn’t intend to cause alarm to anyone.
“We could have gone up at 3pm if we wanted to cause fear or alarm or be reckless.
“We’re all healthy and fit, we all do rock climbing – we’ve been doing this for 10-plus years.”
However, the sheriff stressed: “Very, very qualified climbers come to grief.”
Guilty
Culpable and reckless conduct is a charge which has no specific definition but deals with acts which cause injury to others or create the risk of injury.
The sheriff convicted Law of an alternative charge of breaching the peace.
He said: “In the circumstances, I’m not persuaded that there is danger to anybody else.
“It seems to me little short of lunacy that anybody would do this but that’s a different matter.
“If anybody was looking, it seems to me that that would cause considerable alarm and fear.
“Having regard to the nature of the offence, which seems to me to be extremely serious… this sort of behaviour has to be looked at seriously.
“It’s not acceptable for people to come to the bridges to climb.”
The sheriff ordered reports and released Law on bail.
He will be sentenced on May 11.
In November, two other men from Northumberland in Law’s party admitted culpably and recklessly climbing and descending the tower.
Both 35-year-old Stephen Sinclair from Ashington and 36-year-old Christopher Allsopp from Cramlington, were fined £1,600 each plus £75 victim surcharges.
History of illegal stunts
YouTuber Law has hit headlines dozens of times in recent years for dangerous and brazen stunts.
He recently paddleboarded across a famous Welsh aqueduct, snuck in and spent a night in the National Theatre and allegedly managed to get a Premier League match involving his local side suspended by flying a drone over St Mary’s Stadium.
He has also been reprimanded in the dock for scaling the Severn Bridge and the Tyne Bridge.
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