CONVICTED (2024) | Simon Thomas, born 29 August 1982, of 1 Pembury Place, Hackney, London E5 8LX – caught on camera repeatedly beating an XL Bully with a shovel.

Horrific footage captured by a resident on Wednesday 8 November 2023 showed a man, later identified as Simon Thomas, repeatedly striking the young dog in the head with a large tool in a rear garden at a block of flats.

Volunteers from XL Bully Rescue and Foundation went to the animal’s aid. They were joined at the scene by police officers.

The dog, whom rescuers named Zeus, was taken by police to an animal hospital where he was treated for severe head injuries, bleed to the brain, smashed teeth and fractured ribs.

Thomas later handed himself into into a police station and was ultimately charged with animal cruelty.

Zeus, seemingly good-natured despite his ordeal, was initially held in police kennels pending their investigation, but was ultimately put to sleep because of his breed.

In court Thomas pleaded not guilty, with his defence being based on claims that he was not identifiable in the video footage. He was convicted after a short trial, however.

His sentencing hearing was on 2 February 2024.

Despite public outrage over the sadistic cruelty inflicted on a helpless animal and a Lady Freethinker petition urging the British justice system to impose an appropriate sentence on Thomashe walked free with his sole punishment a contribution towards costs and a ONE-year ban on keeping dogs.

A Met Police spokesperson said: “After a viral video of a man beating a dog, Ace, with a shovel, Status Dogs Unit officers arrested and charged a male. He was remanded and pleaded not guilty.

“At trial the charge was altered to a Section 4 (2) person responsible for allowing suffering, as he claimed it wasn’t him hitting the dog. He admitted that the dog was his.”

Speaking about the case animal rescue volunteers said that the brutal attack on Zeus was one of the worst things they’d ever witnessed.

The group said that the abandonment and abuse of XL Bullies had skyrocketed off the back of the UK Government’s banning of the breed, which was announced by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in September 2023.

One volunteer said: “Because [XL Bullies] are on the banned list, people are getting rid of them and this is where they’re ending up. There are loads more like him out there.”

The group said the government’s pledge to ban the breed had immediately sparked a rise in the dogs being abandoned and abused, with some owners threatened they will be evicted if they do not get rid of their dogs.

They said that many had been given away for free leading to them ending up in the hands of “the wrong people”.

One volunteer, who said rescues like theirs were overwhelmed, broke into tears as she described some of the cases they had been dealing with. She said: “We seized one from police last Monday that had been chained up outside and beaten.

“Yesterday we had two cases where they were thrown out of a car and abandoned.”

Sadly it is growing increasingly difficult to find safe places for the dogs.

“We are full,” the rescuer said. “No kennels are taking them now. Where do these animals go?

“There are hundreds and hundreds of XL Bullies suffering, and being put to sleep, and being abandoned.

“If something does not happen now, we are going to be seeing much, much more of this. This is absolute animal brutality.”

On the rise in attacks by the breed, she said: “It is not the dogs, it is the owners.

“These are dogs that are being beaten, severely abused, and when we take them after two days they are a completely different dog.

“They show no aggression, they don’t want to harm anybody, they just want you to love them.”

Sentencing | contribution towards costs. 12-month ban on keeping dogs (expires February 2025).

The Standard
Daily Mail
The Sun