Two former friends have been found guilty of cutting down the Sycamore Gap tree in an act of "deliberate and mindless criminal damage".
Daniel Graham and Adam Carruthers were convicted for felling the iconic landmark in Northumberland.
They were convicted of causing £622,191 of damage to the tree and £1,144 of damage to Hadrian's Wall, which was struck when the sycamore fell.
The court heard the pair drove through a storm for 30 miles in the middle of the night from their homes in Cumbria to the Northumberland landmark.
Two former friends have been found guilty of cutting down the Sycamore Gap tree in an act of 'deliberate and mindless criminal damage'
PA
One of them cut down the sycamore with a chainsaw while the other filmed the act.
Newcastle Crown Court heard the pair kept a wedge of the trunk as a trophy.
They spent the next day "revelling" in news reports about their actions, the court was told.
Prosecutors said the "odd couple" who did everything together thought it would be "a bit of a laugh".
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS:
The "totemic" sycamore had stood for more than 100 years in a dramatic dip in Hadrian's Wall.
It had become a popular spot for everything from picnics to proposals and achieved worldwide fame when featured in the 1991 Kevin Costner film Robin Hood: Prince Of Thieves.
Prosecutor Richard Wright KC told the court: "Though the tree had grown for over a hundred years, the act of irreparably damaging it was the work of a matter of minutes."
Wright added. by the time their trial started 18 months later, the pair had “lost their courage” and their once close friendship had collapsed, with each apparently blaming the other.
Prosecutors said the 'odd couple' who did everything together thought it would be 'a bit of a laugh'
PA
While giving evidence, Graham alleged that Carruthers had an unusual obsession with the sycamore tree, claiming he once called it “the most famous tree in the world” and expressed a desire to cut it down.
He even kept a piece of string in his workshop that he had reportedly used to measure its trunk.
Carruthers, however, denied these claims in court and expressed confusion over the public reaction, dismissing the tree as “just a tree.”
During cross-examination, Wright challenged Carruthers, asking: “Is that what’s at the heart of this? You thought it was ‘just a tree’, and when the rest of the world didn’t think it was ‘just a tree’ and it was a terrible and wicked thing to have done, you’ve lost your bottle and can’t own up to it?"
Sentencing is scheduled for July 15.
