Repercussions for animal cruelty - what should they be?

[Snoof]

I hope this is ok, it shouldn't contain any graphic details and certainly no pictures.

What do you think the punishment should be for animal cruelty? Does it make a difference if the animal lives on or not? Is there such a thing as "emotional" cruelty towards animals? Should that carry the same consequences as physical cruelty?

What would you like to see done to enhance the CP's ability to detect and act on animal cruelty?

I figured this might make people feel less powerless as they can offer input rather than reading about animals who had the misfortune of falling foul of rotten, morally decrepit people and having no way to offer truly useful input? Just tell me to sod off if I'm wrong!

[yola]

There is an animal cruelty law going through parliament at the moment; there was a petition I signed (and also wrote to my MP asking him to support the bill), which gave additional powers of prosecution to the RSPCA and the police, and stricter penalties for animal abuse.

I'm not sure if it differentiated between physical and mental cruelty - I'd have to look back through at it. However it is a difficult and subjective thing to police - how would mental cruelty to an animal be defined? And would be be judging it by human or animal standards?

[Donna]

What sort of punishments are dished out to scum that do things like this? I have no idea. Probably nothing knowing this country. But this is what I wanted to do, by posting this link, talk about it, and find out things that I dont already know, see if there are laws etc etc.

[JemBob]

think if you MURDER an animal you should get a year in jail and banned from owning pets for life simple as that. But there is something the rspca want like pet police where it also gives permisson for your council to come into your house and remove your pets away from you if they are not kept in good living coundtions and if they dont have all the things that a pet needs which is a bit freaky, but anyways just have to wait and see

[JemBob]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...015978,00.html

dont know if this has already been posted but here you go

[Snoof]

Yes, KO, I'm a bit worried that law might swing the pendulum too far at first.

By the way, not to be pedantic, but linguistically, "murder" applies only to killing within a species - so a cat can murder another cat and a human can murder another human, but a human can't murder a cat. Which, I believe, is why the punishments for killing another species are more ambiguous.

That very distinction allows us to put suffering animals to sleep (and, sadly, to do so with animals who don't need it), to kill certain animals for food, and to kill wild animals who present a danger to humans, cattle or pets.

Mixed bag, really. But the distinction is there linguistically and legally.

I do very much agree with your proposed sentence, however.

[JemBob]

wow bit blown away with that lol

good point tho

[Snoof]

Sorry, I didn't mean for it to come off snarky - but whenever someone says killing a pet is like murder I think "but if it were legally so we'd not be able to have them put to sleep when it's necessary and would be kinder to do so" - and that is a right I personally find very important.

[JemBob]

i didnt think that its true what you said tho

[Donna]

This is where it all gets a bit complicated, as you say we put our pets to sleep if we feel it is necessary but that is not murder but we are ending their life

Maybe we can have the law changed where if it is done to someone elses pet without their permission it could count as murder. But then if we accidently run a cat over and it dies, where do we stand legally there? Is that manslaughter (or catslaughter).

I dont think we can have out and out murder laws for animals but there has to be stronger punishments dependant on the type of cruelty and the way the animal died etc.