Potato farmer loses appeal of slope violation conviction

Alex Docherty, farmer and chairman of the P.E.I Potato Board, has lost an appeal of his conviction for cultivating land on a slope that was too steep.

In 2013, Docherty and his brother-in-law Blake MacDonald were found guilty in provincial court of planting row crops the summer before on landthat was too steep at a property in Kingston. They were fined more than $3,000 each.

Supreme Court Justice Wayne Cheverie saidafter reviewing the casehe saw no reason to order a new a new trial.

Docherty's lawyers had asked the Supreme Court of P.E.I. to overturn his conviction, sayingtrial judge Nancy Orr made errors in her judgement and the land was not too steep to plant crops.

Under the watercourse and wetland protection regulations of the province's Environmental Protection Act, no person can cultivate a row crop on land with a slope greater than nine per cent without an approved management plan.

Docherty is the husband of Community Affairs Minister Valerie Docherty.