CONVICTED (2012) | badger baiters Barry Shane Scott, born 12/07/1988, of 35 Norman Crescent, Sunnyfields, Doncaster DN5 8RX, Daniel Paul Davey, born 16/08/1990, of 27 Manor Court, Denaby, Doncaster DN12 4LT, and Liam Smith, born 15/12/1990, of 33 Denaby Avenue, Conisbrough, Doncaster DN12 3NL
From left Daniel Davey, Barry Scott and Liam Smith
Barry Scott, Liam Smith and Daniel Davey admitted interfering with a badger sett in the Whitwell area and causing unnecessary suffering to a dog on 30 November 2011.
The court heard that the trio had gone equipped with spades and tracking equipment to locate a badger. A terrier-type dog suffered severe injuries to her face when she was forced to enter a badger sett.
The men pleaded guilty on the basis that the offences resulted from reckless behaviour. The RSPCA, which prosecuted the case, believed there was deliberate intent and a mini-trial was held to decide what exactly happened.
Daniel Paul Davey was described in court as a “prime mover” when it came to the persecution of badgers
Deputy District Judge Goodman said all three had lied about their intentions at the mini-trial in which Davey came across as ‘the prime mover.’ Smith was a willing participant while Scott allowed himself to be led by them.
Sentencing: Davey and Smith were given a 20-week custodial sentence. Scott was handed a 16-week jail term, suspended for a year. He was also ordered to do 250 hours of unpaid work, with £250 costs. All three were banned from keeping animals for an indefinite period.Six dogs were seized.
CONVICTED (2012) | Lorraine Farrell, born 18/11/1966, and husband Patrick Farrell, born c. 1956, both of 32 The Coppins, New Addington, Croydon CR0 9DE – left a badly injured puppy to starve on a urine-soaked mattress with a bone sticking out of his leg.
The Farrells pleaded guilty to neglecting the Staffordshire bull terrier puppy known as Caesar.
The dog was found in May 2012 after the RSPCA were called to the Farrells’ home by police. He was severely underweight and suffering from infected dog bite injuries all over his body, as well as broken bones that had pierced his skin.
Caesar was given treatment but had to be put to sleep two days later on veterinary advice. A vet estimated that he had been suffering for at least three months.
Despite being given treatment the eight-month-old puppy was put to sleep on veterinary advice.
The couple pleaded guilty to causing unnecessary suffering to an animal, due to their failure to provide exercise and an adequate diet, veterinary treatment and protection from painful dog bites.
RSPCA Inspector Becky London said: “This is a really sad case and was made worse by the knowledge that the dog couldn’t be saved. Poor Caesar had no joy at all in his short life.
“He spent all of his time in an upstairs bedroom while the other dogs lived downstairs. He had a bone infection and septicaemia, and I’ve never seen a dog with an open fracture before – I was shocked. He had pus and blood coming out of his many wounds”.
Sentencing: Patrick Farrell was sentenced to four months in prison, his wife to just 12 weeks. Both received a 15-year ban on keeping an animal (expires December 2027).
CONVICTED (2012) | serial wildlife persecutors Jamie Atkinson, born 31/10/1992, of 8 Honister Drive, Workington CA14 3XY, and Daniel James Porter, born c. 1994, of 27 Eskdale Crescent, Workington CA14 3LJ – goaded their lurcher dogs into attacking cats
Jamie Atkinson (left) and Daniel Porter
Atkinson and Porter went on trial alongside a 17-year-old youth and two 15-year-olds, none of whom could be named for legal reasons.
The youths went on trial in December 2012 and were found guilty of causing unnecessary suffering.
Unfortunately all newslinks relating to the sentencing have been removed, though we do know that Atkinson was given a custodial sentence in a young offenders institution and banned from keeping dogs for five years. He was caught breaching that ban in February 2018 and again in October 2018.
CONVICTED (2012) | Shane S Spearpoint, born 25 August 1988, of Lower Rainham Road, Rainham, Gillingham ME8 7TN – left a Staffy to starve to death over several weeks while feeding another dog.
Builder Shane Spearpoint was prosecuted by the RSPCA in relation to two-year-old Alfie, who was found collapsed at his home.
RSPCA inspector Ray Bailey said: “I have been an inspector for 17 years and I have never seen anything as bad as this. This poor dog was collapsed, barely conscious and completely emaciated – just lying in the corner of the room.”
Inspector Bailey scooped up the skeletal dog and took him straight to a vet. The vet told the inspector that Alfie would have no chance of survival and he was put to sleep to end his suffering.
Inspector Bailey said: “Even experienced veterinary staff were moved to tears when they saw Alfie.”
Alfie weighed just eight kilos – a male Staffordshire bull terrier should weigh around 18 kilos.
A post mortem revealed that Alfie had a lamb bone stuck in his throat, probably as a result of scavenging for food.
In interview Spearpoint, who at the time was living in Corporation Road, Gillingham, said that he had not fed Alfie for weeks as he felt that the dog belonged to his ex girlfriend who had moved out. He had been feeding his other dog though, while leaving Alfie to slowly starve.
Sentencing | jailed for 12 weeks; £1,455 in costs. Banned for life from keeping animals.
CONVICTED (2012) | Marc Anthony Else, born 12 October 1989, of Priestsic Road, Huthwaite, near Sutton-in-Ashfield NG17 2AE – launched a fatal attack on his pet dog
Marc Else lost his temper with white Staffy Ellie after, he claimed, she had bitten him in the face during the early hours of the morning.
The animal, who had been poorly, then fouled on the carpet and curtains so Else grabbed her by the throat and threw her out of the house causing her abdominal injuries.
He then dragged her back in, putting her in the bath and biting a chunk out of her ear.
Finally Else put the dog in a cage downstairs and admitted himself to hospital because he wanted to undergo a mental health assessment.
Ellie died the next morning and a post-mortem revealed she had been underweight, had fractures to the liver and was bleeding from the left ear which had been partly torn off.
Else, who admitted two charges of causing unnecessary suffering to an animal, was said to have been abused when he was a child and was now receiving psychiatric treatment.
Sentencing: suspended 18-week jail sentence and a 10-year ban from keeping animals (expired December 2022).
CONVICTED (2012) | Jordan James Morgan, previously of Bloomfield Road, Blackpool, but as of July 2020 of Lydia Street, Accrington BB5 0PX – set fire to an animal sanctuary, resulting in the deaths of 26 rescue animals
On March 23, 2011, the then 18-year-old Jordan Morgan and accomplice Karl Heaton of Smithy Lane in St. Annes deliberately set fire to the Easterleigh Animal Shelter in St. Annes, killing five cats, four kittens, 16 chickens and one rabbit. The pair also caused £25,000 worth of damage to the premises of the cash-strapped animal charity.
2019 Facebook image of Jordan Morgan
As well as the starting the blaze at Easterleigh, Morgan and Heaton admitted setting fire to the Fylde Scout headquarters on Heyhouse Lane, a Volkswagen van on Clarendon Road, and a garage on Church Road in St Annes.
July 2020: Jordan Morgan has three dogs, one of whom has just given birth to 12 puppies. He also has a cat. Morgan’s current girlfriend describes him as “a good egg”.
We don’t have anything new on Heaton yet but any information on him, especially a mugshot and his current whereabouts, would be welcome.
CONVICTED (2012) | Paul McCaw, born 03/09/1985, of 66 Laurel Avenue, Newton-le-Willows WA12 8JA – stabbed an arthritic terrier to death before burying her in his back garden
Staffy Cheech “died an absolutely terrible, violent death” at the hands of her owner McCaw.
RSPCA inspectors visited McCaw’s home after a tip-off from neighbours who noticed Cheech was missing. Some reportedly heard the dog’s cries and yelps the previous evening.
Prosecuting, Peter Mitchell said: “He said that the dog collapsed in pain, so he took it into the back garden and he strangled it.”
But when inspectors dug up the body, they found the ten-year-old dog covered in multiple stab wounds and soaked in blood.
RSPCA inspectors found Cheech, pictured, covered in blood and stab wounds buried in the back garden
Mr Mitchell said that one of the wounds looked as if McCaw had attempted to “slash its wrist”. Cheech also had wounds to her head, chest and neck.
In total Cheech suffered 40 wounds – with one puncturing a lung – causing her to collapse. The dog eventually died, drowning in her own blood.
Mark Brown, defending, told magistrates: “He was of the view that Cheech was suffering and needed to be put out of its misery.”
He said McCaw tried to smother the dog, but it didn’t work, so he stabbed her.
RSPCA inspector Louise Showering said: ‘This dog suffered an absolutely terrible, violent death at the hands of an owner who had been responsible for her for almost her entire life.
‘Though he says he thought he was putting her out of her misery, he actually caused her to suffer much more with the actions he took. First trying to suffocate her then stabbing her many, many times.
‘I can’t imagine what this dog’s final hours must have been like at the hands of someone she loved.
‘It certainly wasn’t the dignified and pain-free end most owners hope for their beloved pets.’
Sentence: jailed for 18 weeks. Banned from keeping animals for 20 years (expires November 2032).
CONVICTED (2012) | Saima Bi, born 19/05/1986, of Sunderland Road, Manningham, Bradford BD9 4QJ, and Kiran Hussain, born 09/10/1993, of Ackworth Street, West Bowling, Bradford BD5 7HA – kept a skeletal large breed dog locked up in a squalid hot car covered in faeces because they said she was “violent”
Kiran Hussain (left) and Saima Bi were banned from keeping animals for just five years over their cruel treatment of a dog they kept locked in a faeces-ridden car
Saima Bi and Kiran Hussain, who at the time were living together in East Squire Lane, Bradford BD8, pleaded guilty to causing unnecessary suffering to Bella, a Staffordshire bull terrier-type dog, and not giving her a suitable place to live.
Magistrates heard a member of the public tipped off the RSPCA in July 2012 that the dog was living in a car parked outside Bi and Hussain’s then home in Manningham.
Bella was found lying beside her own faeces in the Seat car, left outside Kiran Hussain and Saima Bi’s home in Bradford. The couple refused to let the pet in their house.
When RSPCA Inspector Sarah Brisco went to investigate, she found starved Bella curled up on the seat and thought she was dead.
Nigel Monaghan, prosecuting, said the smell in the car had been “overwhelming” and that Insp Brisco had “never in all her experience seen a dog so thin”.
“The dog was almost skeletal with rib and hip bones sticking up clearly visible, faeces was all over the car and there were flies,” he said.
Bella was desperately thin and lucky to be alive after her ordeal at the hands of her cruel owners
Until the hearing Bi had insisted she wanted Bella back because she was a guard dog and loved her but she did finally did sign her over to the RSPCA to find a new home.
Defending solicitor Zanfar Khan said her clients both held their hands up to show “remorse and upset”.
Miss Khan said Bi and Hussain said it was Bella who got into the car and that because she was violent it was difficult to get her out.
After sentencing, Insp Brisco said Bella was now doing well.
Sentencing: 100 hours of unpaid work with five days of a low-level activity requirement; costs of £260 each. Banned from keeping animals for five years (expired 2017).
#MostEvil | Jamie Lee Blake from Thetford, Norfolk (currently at HMP Bedford) for microwaving a stray cat to death while high on crack cocaine.
Crack cocaine addict Jamie Blake from Thetford, Norfolk, and currently in HMP Bedford for false imprisonment
Blake cooked the young male black cat for three minutes in his bedsit while he was in a drug-induced psychosis.
Blake had befriended the cat, which he nicknamed Buddy, by letting him into his room at night and feeding him cheese and tuna.
He claimed that he argued with Buddy because he had told him that his mother’s former partner, now dead, had been injecting her with heroin.
After killing the cat, he later laughed and joked about his death with fellow residents at the John Room House sheltered housing unit where he lived in Thetford, Norfolk.
Buddy’s body was later found discarded in a wheelie bin along with the defendant’s microwave.
Staff at the unit viewed CCTV footage which showed him picking the cat up by the scruff of his neck and taking him into his room.
The footage showed him later leaving his room with a carrier bag which appeared to have the cat in it and then disposing of the microwave the following day.
Cat hair and other ‘matter associated’ with the cat was found in the microwave.
A post mortem carried out on Buddy confirmed that he had been microwaved to death.
Sally Dale, mitigating for Blake, said her client had a personality disorder which had been exacerbated by the use of crack cocaine.
Sentence: 22 weeks in a young offenders’ institution, banned from keeping animals for life
Updates
September 2015 | Blake was sentenced to six-and-a-half years in jail for his part in the systematic torture of a man over two days over a drug debt. At the time of writing (7/7/18) he remains in custody at HMP Bedford.
January 2019 | Blake was given an extra two years in jail after squirting a bottle of poo at two plumbers and a prison officer.
He was having the sink in his cell unblocked by two plumbers in February 2018 when he carried out the “disgusting” attack.
The court heard, Blake picked up an 18-inch piece of pipe and told the men to “get out” of his cell, before producing a plastic bottle containing faeces which he had prepared.
He had prepared the bottle as part of a planned protest whilst serving his sentence at HMP Bedford.
Blake squirted the bottle directly into the face of one man and then at the other, chasing them out of his cell and squirting them further, the court heard.
He then squirted the bottle into the face of a prison officer who attempted to intervene, the officer subsequently went on long-term absence.
The court was told the bottle’s contents had entered “the facial orifices” of two of the men, who had been left concerned about contracting diseases.
At Luton Crown Court on Friday January 11, 2019 Judge Andrew Bright QC said: “It’s hard to think of a more callous, degrading and disgusting series of assaults on men carrying out their public duties.”
Blake has 29 convictions for 56 offences.
While in prison, he has committed eight assaults on officers as well as two other offences, and has been moved repeatedly to different facilities.
Judge Bright QC said he accepted that Blake had had an “appalling upbringing”.
Two psychiatrists’ reports from 2015 and 2019 determined Blake had an emotionally unstable personality disorder, but otherwise had no diagnosed mental health problems that could be treated.
CONVICTED (2012) | Allan Staughton, born 8 October 1989, of Elmside, Littleport, Ely CB6 1LJ – put his girlfriend’s cat in a tumble drier and posted the footage on YouTube.
Allan Staughton put the tabby cat, called Princess, in the tumble dryer in his former home in Roman Gate, Godmanchester, on June 14, 2012, and turned it on three times.
Magistrates were shown the film he uploaded to YouTube and another forum, titled “You must see this – it will crack you up”.
The video showed the cat being put into the machine as Staughton said she was going for ‘a tumble’.
The machine was turned on with the cat spinning inside for 12 seconds before Staughton opened the door.
The cat was on her back in the bottom of the machine. Staughton then spun it twice more.
The RSPCA tracked Staughton down after the incident was reported by local newspaper The Hunts Post after a concerned forum member contacted them. He was found outside a pub in Godmanchester on July 4, 2012.
Robert Starr, prosecuting said that in interview he said that he thought it was funny and did it because he was having a bad day.
Vet Helen Dennis told magistrates that Princess would have been severely traumatised by the ordeal and it would have been akin to a form of torture for her.
She suffered a broken tooth and a tongue injury in the incident.
The cat had belonged to Staughton’s partner of four-and-a-half years. The relationship broke down over the incident.
Staughton admitted causing unnecessary suffering to a protected animal.
The court heard that he suffers from attention deficit disorder.
Celia Chignell, presiding magistrate, told Staughton: “We see what you did was a form of torture and the aggravating features in this offence are so serious that only an immediate custodial sentence is appropriate.”
Sentencing | jailed for 56 days. Banned from keeping animals for life with the right of appeal after five years.
