A CANCER specialist caught in an "increasing moral dilemma" has been jailed for three years after sabotaging an Oxfordshire firm linked to an animal research laboratory.

Northampton Crown Court heard on Wednesday how Joseph Harris, 26, from Hampshire, caused £11,400 damage by gluing locks, cutting air conditioning cables, flooding with a hosepipe and spraying slogans on the walls of Atlas Material Testing Solutions in Granville Way, Bicester.

Among the slogans he wrote were: "This company kills puppies" and "We have found you".

As well as the Bicester firm, the court heard Harris had also attacked companies in Northampton and Nottingham, which are linked to Cambridgeshire's Huntingdon Life Sciences laboratory.

Harris, who had admitted at a previous hearing three counts of interfering with business relationships to harm an animal research organisation, is now the first person to be convicted under new legislation targeting animal rights campaigners.

Timothy Palmer, prosecuting, said Harris had caused £25,000 damage and was caught by police in Northampton on January 15 this year - the same night he attacked the Bicester company.

He said officers found bolt croppers, a hammer, a torch, Superglue and spray paint in his rucksack - as well as a map of Oxford and animal rights literature in his car.

Mr Palmer said: "The apparent reason for this company being targeted was that it did business with Huntingdon Life Sciences. They had a contract to supply service machinery."

Mr Palmer said the company, whose contract with Huntingdon was worth just £1,000 a year, had been listed on an animal rights website and had received hatemail.

The court heard how Harris, who was working on a treatment for pancreatic cancer after completing his PhD, had come under increasing pressure to conduct animal experiments.

Rebecca Trowler, defending, said Harris had campaigned against animal testing as an undergraduate student.

She said, although he had never tested on animals himself, his work had relied on the findings of colleagues who did.

Ms Trowler said: "This resulted in an increasing moral dilemma and a feeling of guilt.

"His girlfriend had ended their relationship because of his continued work in the field of medical research because she disapproved.

"He, in his own words, had come to a breaking point. He described it as too much to bear."

Ms Trowler said colleagues had described Harris as an "excellent scientist" with a brilliant career ahead of him - but added he had now lost his job.

Sentencing Harris to three years in prison, Judge Ian Alexander said: "You are a highly intelligent and motivated young man, but you have developed a warped moral justification as an explanation for your serious criminal actions."

Detective Superintendent Larry Ennis, of Northamptonshire Police, said: "These crimes were vindictive and potentially extremely dangerous."

Grace Ononiwu, Northamptonshire's chief crown prosecutor, said: "The new legislation allowed the Crown Prosecution Service to bring a charge which took account of the wider campaign of fear and intimidation that the specific offences were part of."