Wild Park

Coordinates: 50°51′18″N 0°06′58″W / 50.855°N 0.116°W / 50.855; -0.116 Wild Park is a public park located in Brighton, East Sussex, England.

Wild Park viewed from Hollingbury Hill, 2008

It is Brighton and Hove's largest Local Nature Reserve (LNR) and has a number of woodland walks and views over the city. The South Downs National Park extends into the city here and species-rich chalk grasslands survive on the south and north-facing slopes surrounding the recreation ground and on the roughs of Hollingbury Park golf course. There are also large patches of chalk scrub, grazing fields (popular with seed-eating birds) and a dew pond.^[1]

In 2012, there were reports of controversy over the plans for the scrub clearance proposed for the park.^[2]

It made the headlines in tragic circumstances on 10 October 1986 when the bodies of two missing nine-year-old girls were found there. A local man called Russell Bishop was charged with their murders and acquitted the following year, though he has been in prison since 1990 serving a life sentence for a sex attack on a seven-year-old girl. In the wake of the double jeopardy law being abolished, prospects were raised of Bishop facing a second trial, but the Court of Appeal ruled out a second prosecution in September 2006.

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