A 44-year-old man has appeared in court charged with the manslaughter of a 20-year-old animal lover who died after getting entangled in farm machinery.

Neil Carpenter has been charged with unlawfully killing Lauren Scott on Springfield Farm in Dawlish, Devon, on March 4 last year.

Carpenter, of Firbank Road, Dawlish, also faces a second charge under the Health and Safety at Work Act in connection with the same incident.

Horse lover Lauren worked as an assistant manager in the Pets Corner in Powderham Castle in nearby Starcross. She also worked at Newton Abbot racecourse.

A tribute at the time of her death was paid by former college student and X Factor singer Luke Friend.

He called her a ‘wonderful and bubbly person at school’ who ‘did not have a care in the world’.

Carpenter was bailed to attend Exeter Crown Court next month for a hearing before a judge.

Prosecutor Mr Chris Bittlestone told Newton Abbot magistrates court that both charges arose out of the same tragic set of circumstances’.

Carpenter did not enter any pleas at the short hearing.