A TYCOON who once tried to prevent ramblers using a right of way on his land has had his estate sequestrated.

Businessman Euan Snowie, 49, hit the headlines when he launched an unprecedented privacy bid to make his Boquhan Estate near Stirling exempt from right-to-roam access rights.

Mr Snowie claimed his family would be put at risk of kidnap unless the entire un-forested portion of his historic estate was excluded from 2003 Land Reform Act’s provisions, and sealed off 46 acres of the 70-acre estate.

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The test case received huge media attention after Mr Snowie was opposed by both Stirling Council and the Ramblers’ Association and he lost the case in 2008 after a five-year battle.

A sheriff said the amount of land Mr Snowie wanted excluded from the act was excessive and that he was only entitled to privacy around the house and immediate gardens.

Sheriff Andrew Cubie ruled he was entitled to exclude the public from only 12.75 acres immediately surrounding his property.

Earlier this year, Mr Snowie, who made a fortune from waste disposal, admitted smashing windows at his estranged wife’s farmhouse, but escaped punishment after a sheriff suggested the businessman had been prosecuted in a situation where others would not have been.

The couple, both 49, were said to have separated in February and since then Mrs Snowie has been living in a farmhouse on their country estate at Kippen while Mr Snowie is occupying its multimillion-pound mansion, Boquhan House.

It is unclear what the sequestration will mean for the house and wider estate.

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Previous court papers showed Boquhan House was owned by both Snowies, and Mr Snowie had said the estate had been purchased in 2001 and had seven properties, stables, a tennis court and extensive managed driveways and garden.

At one stage they were described as one of Scotland’s richest families, but a 2014 case heard they had been torn apart by a bitter feud sparked by a massive unpaid personal loan between brothers.

The family fell out amid allegations of violent threats, sledgehammer-wielding rampages and police involvement.

At that point Mr Snowie claimed his brother Gordon had tried to remove him from his country mansion and declare him bankrupt for failing to pay back a loan they had agreed.

In 2001, Mr Snowie’s family business was paid £38 million for the disposal of animal carcasses following the UK foot-and-mouth outbreak.

Mr Snowie and his brothers, Malcolm, Alistair and Gordon, along with their mother, Sheila, later put the business up for sale and are believed to have sold the waste company for about £40m.

Trustee Claire Middlebrook said: “The estate of Euan Fenwick Snowie, residing at Boquhan House, Boquhan, Stirling, was sequestrated by the Sheriff of Tayside, Central and Fife at Stirling Sheriff Court on August 1, 2017, and I, Claire Middlebrook, Middlebrooks Business Recovery and Advice, Dublin Street, Edinburgh, have been appointed by the court to act as trustee on the sequestrated estate.

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“Any creditor of the debtor named above is invited to submit his statement of claim in the prescribed form, with any supporting account or vouchers to the trustee.”

Sequestration is a form of insolvency that results in a person’s assets being transferred into the control of an appointed trustee so they can be used to satisfy creditors.

The details of why the estate has been sequestrated have not been revealed.