CONVICTED (2016) | Tracy Roberts, born 19 October 1962, of The Highcroft. Connah’s Quay, Deeside CH5 4SD – failed to get veterinary attention for pet dog’s severe skin problem.
The court was told the nine-year-old bull terrier Marshall – left at Roberts’ home by a former partner – needed constant and probably lifetime treatment for his skin condition but he was said to be aggressive and impossible to handle.
Glen Murphy, prosecuting for the RSPCA, said the charity had been contacted by Roberts’ son who requested the dog be taken in as he could not afford the veterinary treatment required.
An inspector found the dog was of normal bodily condition but had an obvious and severe skin condition.
Marshall was so aggressive at the vet’s that he was taken to an animal centre. He was found to have an acute skin condition and dry eyes. The dog had the condition for at least three months but probably longer, but had not been taken to the vet’s.
The RSPCA had previously given advice on how the dog should be treated and had provided two £30 vouchers for the required medication but they did not seem to have been used.
Probation officer Andrew Connah said Roberts accepted full responsibility and had shown genuine remorse for the way things had turned out.
He added that She’d had a difficult time over several years; her daughter and her boyfriend had moved in, and she had moved out because of their chaotic lifestyle.
Sentence: 12-month community order with 60 hours of unpaid work, £300 costs and a £60 surcharge. Banned from keeping any animal for six years (expired April 2022).
CONVICTED (2013) | Evan Lloyd Evans, born c. 1944, of Pencarth Uchaf Farm, Chwilog, Pwllheli LL53 6SW – caused unnecessary suffering and failed to meet the welfare needs of 51 Welsh mountain ponies.
Horse breeder Evan Lloyd Evans was found guilty of keeping 51 horses in appalling conditions at Cricieth Stud, Pwllheli.
The court heard RSPCA officers visited the stud farm on 27 June 2012, and a vet put nine horses to sleep due to untreatable hoof conditions and to prevent further suffering.
Another 50 horses were removed.
Of the 59 horses discovered at Pencarth Uchaf, Chwilog, near Pwllheli only five were found to have normal hooves.
The court was shown harrowing videos made by the RSPCA and the World Horse Welfare charity showing the poor state of the animals’ feet and their living conditions.
Other charges dealt with allegations Evans failed to provide adequate bedding and exposed the horses to hazards.
The court heard the floor in all the sheds were covered in dirty hay. In most of the sheds there were pieces of broken agricultural equipment on which the horses could injure themselves.
The fencing around the pens was makeshift and in a poor state.
RSPCA inspector Mark Roberts said: “The conditions we found at Cricieth Stud were appalling and completely inappropriate for the ponies kept there.
“Many of them had acute problems with their feet and other serious health issues.
“We had been alerted to the fact there were many ponies in unsuitable conditions but did not expect to have to remove 50 of them on veterinary advice.
“In addition the vets also advised that nine had to be put to sleep as sadly their condition was so extreme there was no other way to alleviate their suffering.”
“It was an extremely bad situation made worse by the fact that many of the ponies were virtually unhandled making any necessary treatment incredibly difficult to carry out.”
Nigel Weller, for Evans, said: “He has devoted his life to breeding horses and he is quite proud of what he has achieved with horses which bear the Criccieth prefix. He is quite well known and his animals are desired and he is anxious the bloodline is protected.”
He said the situation had existed at the farm for only a short time and was exacerbated by Evans’ poor health and lack of help.
He told the court the number of horses at the farm had been reduced by two-thirds and the remainder transferred to his daughter who lives nearby and who will be able to care for them with assistance from other family members.
Inspector Roberts said the case highlighted how “over breeding and overstocking can spiral out of control”.
“This is a fair sentence and sends a strong message to all horse owners and breeders that they must put the welfare of their horses before all else,” he added.
Tony Evans, north and mid Wales field officer for World Horse Welfare, said: “It saddens me to think that all the help and advice that was given to the owner failed to have any significant effect.
“As our main priority has to be the welfare of the ponies, we had no choice than to involve the RSPCA to undertake stronger measures.
“In many of the situations we deal with, long and costly prosecution cases can often be avoided if the owner follows the advice given by World Horse Welfare field officers and takes appropriate action.”
The judge was told that looking after the horses since June 2012 had cost the RSPCA £300,000 but that Evans had no money.
Jailing Evans Judge Andrew Shaw said: “For many years you were an owner, keeper and breeder of Welsh mountain ponies. I am treating this as a medium term period of neglect. You ignored warnings and nine animals were in such a poor condition they were euthanised. These are particularly serious offences.”
Sentencing: jailed for 10 weeks. Banned from keeping animals for 10 years (expires November 2023).
Despite Evan Lloyd Evans’ ban on keeping animals still being in force, he was found to have 91 ponies on his land. The ponies were being kept in poor conditions causing suffering to dozens of them.
Evans pleaded guilty to 10 Animal Welfare Act offences and was given a 20-week suspended jail term.
The prosecution followed a multi-agency operation at Evans’ farm in September 2020, after reports horses and other animals were being kept in poor conditions, and – in the case of the ponies – in breach of a pre-existing 10-year ban handed to Evans in 2013.
Video footage shown to the court revealed the conditions at the farm and showed horses stood in filthy, dark and hazardous conditions.
Dozens of horses and other animals were kept in outbuildings, barns and fields in highly inappropriate conditions, with faeces everywhere – and even a bucket of dead rats, the RSPCA said.
The court heard Evans kept 91 ponies in illegal conditions which were unhygienic and not free from hazards.
Vets felt dozens of the horses had suffered unnecessarily – including one, a Welsh Section A pony, who had not received appropriate veterinary care for a broken leg; and another four Section A ponies who had not been given vet attention for lameness. Evans also failed to ensure six of his ponies had appropriate treatment for parasites.
A pony had a severe facial deformity which had gone unchecked. A total of 28 of the ponies suffered as a consequence of Evans’ failure to secure appropriate dental care, while a further eight were also deemed to have suffered through not receiving appropriate hoof care.
In addition to the suspended jail term, Evans was banned from keeping horses and poultry for 20 years, fined £1,000 fine and a £128 victim surcharge.
Evans admitted breaching the previous 10-year ban from keeping equines. His ban was extended by the magistrates and will now continue until 2041.
CONVICTED (2009) | Shane Paul Burt, born c. 1989, of 10 Deans Avenue, Connah’s Quay, Deeside CH5 4QF – filmed his dog trying to kill a badger.
Burt was found guilty of wilfully attempting to kill a badger after being prosecuted under the Badgers Act 1992.
The court heard the horrible attack happened in Dock Road, Connah’s Quay, sometime between September 30 and November 26, 2008.
Acting on information there was mobile phone footage that would incriminate Burt, police executed a search warrant on his home.
They seized the phone, which was found to have about 30-seconds of sickening footage showing the dog attacking the badger.
The footage ends with the badger leaving the scene.
Burt told police his dog had been injured in the attack and that he had washed the injuries with warm, salted water.
He said that the dog – a lurcher/Staffy named Hooch – had since been put down.
After the case, North Wales Police Wildlife and Environmental Officer Sgt Rob Taylor said: “I am very pleased with the result. It was a callous and sick act.”
Sentencing | 150 hours of community service; £250 costs. Three-year ban on keeping animals (expired 2012).
CONVICTED (2009) | Dawn Elizabeth Rose, born 25/01/1960, previously of Llangolen, North Wales, and more recently Duncan Street, Brinsworth, Rotherham S60 5DE – allowed 72 horses on her failing stud farm to starve
RSPCA inspectors found desperately emaciated animals on Dawn Rose’s stud farm.
Divorcee Dawn Rose set up a stud farm using a £300,000 pay-out from her ex-partner to fulfil her teenage daughter’s dream of breeding ponies.
But the business was a failure, and when inspectors raided it they found desperately emaciated animals foraging for scraps of food.
Rose pleaded guilty to six charges of causing unnecessary suffering to animals.
The mother-of-two wept as RSPCA prosecutor Glen Murphy said the experienced inspection team had been “stunned” by the appalling condition of the animals on her stud farm.
RSPCA inspector Chris Dunbar first visited Rose in March 2008 when she bought her 42-acre farm to start a stud.
Inspector Dunbar said: “We had concerns from the start as she wasn’t feeding the horses. We kept going back — she listened but did nothing.”
One horse, a chestnut mare called Mist, was little more than a ‘skeleton with skin stretched over’, and the vet who treated her was amazed she could still stand up.
Three others were so weak that they died soon afterwards.
Rose, who had moved to the area from Norfolk, told investigators her money had run out and she could not afford to pay for the animals.
Sitting at Mold magistrates court, district judge Andrew Shaw told Ms Rose: “You neglected these horses in an obvious and shameful way.”
Mr Dunbar added: “We were happy with the ban. Our job is to stop cruelty and in this case that’s what we feel we’ve done.”
Sentencing: three-month sentence suspended for 12 months; 100 hours of unpaid community work. Banned from keeping or being involved with horses for 10 years (expired 2019).
As a bankrupt, Rose was only ordered to pay £250 of the RSPCA’s prosecution costs of £128,554.
CONVICTED (2008) | Clare Elizabeth Frear (aka Clare Taylor), born 15/04/1985, of 8 Juno Street, Nelson BB9 8RH – failed to get treatment for a cat that had been microwaved by her child
Clare Frear
In October 2008 Frear pleaded guilty to causing unnecessary suffering to the cat, named Cassie. She was initially accused of putting the cat into a microwave oven herself, but later blamed her four-year-old son, Declan Frear.
The cat died in agony six hours later and Frear admitted she hadn’t taken her to the vet for treatment.
RSPCA officers found Cassie’s body in a bin bag outside the house.
Sentencing: three-month curfew; costs of £250. Banned from keeping animals for five years (expired 2013).
CONVICTED (2006) | James David Nicholson, born 22/04/1984, at the time of conviction of Station Road, Colwyn Bay, but as at March 2020 living at 67 Pocket Nook Street, St Helens WA9 1NQ – repeatedly beat his dog and hung him from a lamp-post
Nicholson, who works as a part-time DJ under the name N-Tyce, was caught on camera hanging Jack Russell terrier Sweep from a lamp-post as he waited for a takeaway.
Magistrates watched CCTV footage showing Sweep cowering as his owner repeatedly beat him. Nicholson then hung the terrified dog from a lamp-post, before flinging him across a pavement.
Nicholson, who sobbed as he watched the footage in court, was told the attack had caused Sweep “physiological trauma”.
He admitted causing unnecessary suffering to an animal.
Chris Dawson, prosecuting for the RSPCA, said: “He left the dog hanging off the windowsill. When asked why he had done that, he said ‘He kept barking.’
“He said he’d had a bad night, but he hadn’t meant to take it out on the dog.”
Nicholson cried heavily while the footage was played to magistrates, and often shielded his eyes away from the screen.
Magistrates’ chairman Howie Roberts told Nicholson: “Quite frankly, we were disgusted by what we saw on the video.
“We hope you show a lot more respect for the animals in your care.”
Nicholson, a part-time DJ from Station Road, was caught on film outside the Bay Grill takeaway on Seaview Road, Colwyn Bay, just after midnight on 4 September 2005.
He was told he could not take the dog into the shop, but became increasingly angry at the pet barking while he was waiting outside. It was then the brown and white dog’s ordeal started.
The CCTV footage shows the pet being whipped with the handle of the lead several times, flinching at every sudden blow.
Sweep tried to flee the attack, but was stopped from running away because of his lead.
Nicholson then lifted up the dog by the lead, with the Jack Russell hanging in mid-air. His owner tied the top of the lead to a lamppost, and hung the pet there for a few seconds.
But Nicholson seemed to realise the upset he caused Sweep, and took him into his arms. He held the dog close, and peppered him with kisses.
On the walk home, with a petrified Sweep dragging behind on the lead, Nicholson violently yanked the lead, flinging his pet over several feet.
He then kicked Sweep in the side of his body.
An RSPCA report said: “The persistent nature of the behaviour has caused the dog unnecessary suffering, primarily physiological trauma.”
It adds: “The body language of the dog clearly showed that the dog was afraid and repeatedly tried to get away, but was restricted by the lead.”
Gwyndaf Pari, defending, said: “It was a one-off offence, one at the lower end of the scale, perhaps one that was impulsive and one after which he has shown genuine remorse.
“Since then, he has looked after the dog well.
“It is an animal clearly loved by Mr Nicholson.
“He has certainly learned his lesson since, and was dealing with the stress a relatively new job brought. It is something that worried him.”
Sentencing: fined £250 with £262 court costs. He was not banned from keeping animals and was allowed to keep Sweep.
