Kerre Woodham: Throw book at animal abusers

Jeffrey Hurring tortured a young Jack Russell dog for nearly 30 minutes before killing it with a spade.

For that, he got 12 months' jail. Incredibly, that's the longest jail term handed out to anyone convicted of animal cruelty in New Zealand.

He could have, and should have, got a lot longer.

The maximum allowed under the Animal Welfare Act is three years and if, as Judge O'Driscoll stated, this offence was at the worst level of offending, three years would have been a good place to start.

But then Hurring's lawyers would have probably appealed because judges in the past have been so slack when it sentencing in animal cruelty cases.

Remember those two vicious little oiks from Huntly?

Wirimu Karena and Sahn Papa received just nine months a few years ago when they poured highly flammable glue on to some feral cats in a council cage and set them alight.

The Huntly prosecuting sergeant who brought the case found his family cat cut in two and dumped outside the Huntly police station. Hard to believe it was a coincidence.

Karena and Papa are out now and living among us. They've probably perpetuated their DNA. The thought of them being near anything or anyone helpless and vulnerable chills me, but there are plenty of these ugly individuals out there.

I don't know whether it's because they have limited intelligence, or whether they are completely lacking in empathy or whether they're just sick buggers, but sadly there are plenty of them.

Hurring's just the latest in a long line of young men who get their kicks out of hurting small, defenceless creatures.

Psychiatrists concur that while not all people who harm animals become serial killers, all serial killers have tortured animals. The fact that our judges don't seem to regard these crimes as serious is truly concerning.

One of Papa's dodgy Huntly mates wasn't surprised that Papa had set cats on fire. What really blew his tiny mind was that anyone could go to jail for such an offence.

It's great to see that an illustrious roll call of top QCs and barristers have donated their time free of charge to help the SPCA bring animal cruelty cases to court. Twenty-one of the country's best lawyers willing to work pro bono will make a huge difference to the SPCA.

But the judges have to be seen to be taking animal cruelty cases seriously, because until they do, people who have grown up in a moral vacuum won't realise how wrong it is to hurt defenceless creatures.

* www.kerrewoodham.com