- Between 2016 and 2018, 4,401 people were involved in cases of mistreatment and abandonment of a domestic animal, a figure that increased by 29% during this period, reveals the National Observatory on Delinquency and responses (ONDRP) in a study published this Thursday.
- The authors are essentially adult men, unemployed, who act in the summer.
- 858 people were convicted of acts of cruelty to a pet between 2007 and 2017. The number of convictions increased by 57% over this period.
The 30-second video sparked emotion on social media. A young man, dressed in gray pants and a black top, opens the trunk of a white Citroën registered in Haute-Corse in which there is a calf. " Oh ! He pissed! That the… ! He says. Then, it seizes the frightened animal by the legs and throws it from the top of a bridge. " Oh ! Shit ! Comments, amused, that films the scene. After its release, the Bastia package opened an investigation. Tuesday morning, a suspect, knowing he was wanted, presented himself to the gendarmerie and was placed in police custody, said a source familiar with the matter.
The young adult, born in 2000, told investigators that the events took place in 2019 and said he did not know how the video ended up on the Internet. “He said he had hit a calf with his car and did not know what to do with it. To shorten his suffering, he threw it into a ravine, "explains 20 minutes the prosecutor of Bastia, Caroline Tharot. At the end of his police custody, he was placed in pre-trial detention and will be tried in immediate appearance this Thursday.
Like the authors of this atrocious fact, more and more people are, each year, challenged by the justice in cases of animal mistreatment. Between 2016 and 2018, their number increased by 23%, from 1,025 to 1,256. In 80% of cases, they are men, mainly adults, indicates a study by the National Observatory of Delinquency and Criminal Responses (ONDRP) published this Thursday. A third of the respondents indicated that they were "without profession, unemployed or unemployed". The rest are either retired (15%), educated or students (7%), or even farmer farmers (7%).
A 57% increase in the number of convictions
The authors face a sentence of two years' imprisonment and a fine of 30.00 euros, to which may be added additional penalties, such as the ban on owning an animal. The number of convictions continues to increase: between 2007 and 2017, it went from 70 to 110, an increase of 57%. "This increase was particularly strong from 2015, the date on which animals were recognized as living beings endowed with sensitivity in the civil code," notes the ONDRP.
On average, over this period, a third of those convicted of cruelty to a domestic animal were fined, 29% a suspended sentence, 23% an alternative measure, and 16% of the firm imprisonment. It is mainly between June and August that the facts take place, observes Fiona Frattini, the author of this study. It is also during the summer that the shelters, with the SPA in mind, collect the most animals abandoned by owners preferring to go on vacation rather than assume their responsibilities.
Difficult investigations
The number of people accused of abandoning their animals is also increasing. It went from 257 in 2016 to 395 in 2018, an increase of 54% in three years! More than a third (38%) of animals abandoned between 2007 and 2017 were abandoned in rural communities, and 33% in cities with fewer than 50,000 inhabitants. Investigations by the police to find their owners are often difficult, as animals are not necessarily identified by a flea or a tattoo.
Between 2016 and 2018, the 62 shelters of the SPA collected 26,375 abandoned animals. Taking into account those who have been taken in from other shelters, this number increases to 47,915.
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