75ZT Community

Not always funny.

In Youth Court today a 16 year old lad appeared, charged with animal cruelty contrary to the Animal Welfare Act 2006.

He stole a German Shepherd puppy from a garden and took it to his father's industrial unit.

He tied the puppy spread-eagled to a wooden pallet, then proceeded to have sexual intercourse with it, causing the dog, as you might imagine, serious internal injuries. Then, over a period of four days, with the dog still tied to the pallet, systematically tortured her by cutting with a kitchen paring knife, burning with both flame and acid, attempting to put a plastic bag over the dog's head, kicking it, finally attempting to drill a hole in the dog's head with an electric drill. At one point, he inverted the pallet, so the dog was underneath, and attempted to stand on it but was unsuccessful, being unable to achieve balance.

Apparently, an HGV driver, dropping his trailer at an adjacent unit just after midnight, heard the dog in obvious distress and called the Police.

We can be absolutely certain as to precisely what the youth had been doing because he had a camera set up and was filming his exploits on successive occasions, the Police finding the camera on the premises when they effected entry.

He was interviewed under caution by the Police and we heard an officer ask why he had done these things.

The youth explained that she (the dog) was "gagging for it" and he was bored with the school holidays.

The dog was beyond help and was destroyed at the scene by a vet. The post mortem report, for obvious reasons, doesn't need to be described here.

The youth was remanded to the care of the local authority pending reports.

Some days are not so good. This one will stay with me and my colleagues for some time to come I think.

There should only be one punishment for acts as sick as that and it involves 6 feet of rope and the nearest lamp post!

I'm horrified. I cannot believe people descend to these depths. I'm lost for words, really.
Dare not tell the wife about this, she would demand that I take her to lynch him herself.

For things like this the death penalty would be too soft an option.

The liberals of course will subscribe the need for loving treatment and help. Surely this type of individual is seriously deranged? As we are not allowed to painfully destroy them, a minimum of section, to be kept at Her Majesty's pleasure should apply. The statute book probably recommends 6 weeks community needlework!

Unfortunately people like this truly disturbed and warped individual are indeed very often a product of the most ghastly home lives....not always I grant you...and this is not proffered as an 'excuse' on any level...but quite possibly 'loving treatment' is something completely alien to this character and hence his own view of reasonable, empathetic and thoughtful behaviour towards other people / animals has been completely cauterised.....if the child is like this then there is every reason to look very carefully at said homelife and the people responsible for creating such a twisted and dangerous individual. It is unlikely...though not impossible.....that he was born like this... Truly the stuff of nightmares.

Sometimes I am sickened to call my self a member of the human race.

Perhaps the parents should be chemically neutered. Orwellian, perhaps but in a future and even darker world dressed in other terminology, it may have to be considered?

When you hear of the depths of depravity that some sink to, the first is the horror; next the condemnation; then the despair; and finally the vain search for retribution. I say finally because that’s usually where the interest of the laity peters out, very few of us being able to rationalise the terrible events in evidence, seen as they are from the perspective of our own morality and upbringing.

We see only the ultimate horrific event in isolation and none of the multitude of contributory factors that, even the Judge Jeffreys amongst us (and I admit my fluctuating membership of that club) must agree, have surely congealed to culminate in the unbelievable result. Included in the hunt for retribution of course is that salve of the conscience, blame. First the parents. Or, these days, parent singular. Then environment. Then lack of ‘role models’.

So, Nature or Nurture? Or a bit of both? Can some undisclosed mental/genetic legacy lie dormant? I have no medical qualification or training so cannot hazard a guess, but I’d suggest that it’s unlikely. A ganglion gone awry? (I forget the author of that but gladly acknowledge an apposite phrase). No, I think a more likely demon is culture. Ours, that is. The one we all work our way through with varying degrees of privilege, damage, joy and sacrifice. We permit and even encourage the seeping drip of indoctrination of our young through on-line sites. One drip at a time is inaudible, if only we could hear the full roar of the torrent that eventually fills the senses we might actually do something about it. We permit and encourage the sexualisation of prepubescent children through what we mistakenly call (depending on what shore of the pond we inhabit) Comics or Funny Papers. Not very comical or funny at all. Talking of the ‘pond’, we permit and encourage pond life like Frankie Boyle to peddle his degenerative sewage on TV/DVD.

When the stink from all that cumulative garbage finally reaches our flared nostrils can anyone say they played no part in it? It’s too late now, that individual has mutated from the innocent perfection he once was. The only sanction available to prevent his escalating brutality progressing to people, as if the unfortunate animal he tortured wasn’t enough, is to lock him up for ever. I pity his awaiting prison peers.

Sorry it’s so long, got to get it out.

I read Paul's disturbing post yesterday before anyone else had responded - I didn't know what to say or how to respond to such a thing - nearly 24 hours later I am still shocked and can offer nothing further to add to what has already been said.

A little background to the case. Necessarily limited as this was a Court of first instance, and although a guilty plea was entered, clearly sentencing could not take place without in depth reports.

The lad is the middle of three siblings, all male, with his older sibling at university. He seems of reasonable intelligence and is well able to articulate. He is being prepared for university, where he intends to study history, at one of the better schools in the local area.

He has one previous conviction for an offence under the same Act, for which he received a referral order some 18 months ago, which he completed successfully. The precise details were not available.

He lives with both parents, his father being a haulage contractor and his mother working in an administrative capacity for the family business. Even in these straitened times, money doesn't appear to be a source of worry.

Aged 11, I was a cub and on the way home, after an evening meeting we (3 friends) unknowingly were followed. We parted and our friend Malcolm continued on alone.

Somewhere towards his home, he was savagely beaten to death and could only be identified by his badge.

I investigated the case history many years later. His assailant (mid 30's) came from a good family etc etc and listed cake-making as a pastime. As a child he'd mutilated animals, imprisoned friends etc etc. What happened back then - nothing - a slap on the wrist and away he went. Result my young friend was denied his life.

Why, oh why are we blind to the fact that these people are rotten to the core and need locking away for ever. Would you ever really want him as a child minder, or a future son in law, even if he did had a good conduct ratification certificate from The European Court of Human Rights etc etc (con't page 96)!

We never ever learn and pretty soon maty will be back, cleaning his dad's hubcaps and checking the tachograph, as he progresses to university. Then one day through an organic chain reaction an atrocity will result. Such people are ticking time-bombs, mentally dysfunctional and a public menace,

Family circumstances, how good his siblings are etc etc, should be treated as 'non sequitur' and inadmissible. It's the sickness and evil hidden deep inside them that's important - because that and not their home life, modelling club results etc, are what surface to commit such hideous infamy.

Which is why, in this case, he needs to be sectioned or detained at Her Majesty's Pleasure...

Oh, dear. I posted my last on the assumption that it was a first offence and suggested it would lead to escalation. It now appears that has already happened. I fear it’s a lost cause.

Another gilded youth with so many privileges, mysteriously going off the rails and now unable to fulfil his glittering potential. At least the ’popular’ press can’t trot out the usual ’council estate’ or ’deprivation’ rubbish. And nobody can understand why it happened. His devastated parents and brothers will have shattered lives as well as him, even more so as they will undoubtedly blame themselves entirely.

Now the special case pleading circus starts. He will be assigned counsellors, social workers, psychiatrists, nannies. He’ll learn how to bamboozle teams of woolly minded do-gooders trying their damndest to strengthen their street cred among their colleagues with the latest trendy soft-pedalling techniques. He will be advised to sue his teachers for negligence and lack of pastoral care. In an effort to rehabilitate him it will cost untold millions over many years, then he will do it again under a new identity. And not on an animal. And other parents will suffer just as much as his.

He’ll get hospitalised where the incarceration is soft by comparison, if he gets locked up at all. What about everyone else’s safety?

I think I can hear Judge Jeffreys rattling his bones.

Jumper....methinks your jaded view of what happens to young offenders is understandable given the stories trotted out by the popular press but, in my experience, your description of what occurs is somewhat wide of the reality. It will be of interest to all of us as to what occurs in this particular instance.

I refer everyone to my 1st post on this thread.......

This lads problems clearly started a long time ago and will be a minefield to sort out. He will need close supervision and long term monitoring. He will need assessment and diagnosis. He might end up in a special hospital under the mental health act. Who can say if he will respond to treatment or not. One can hope he does not slip through the system and get another chance to re-offend be it in the long term. We do not have all of the facts because of confidentiality. Keep us posted within the parameters allowed.

Although having no further dealings with this case, I heard today that the defendant is in secure psychiatric care and is likely to remain there indefinitely as things stand at the moment. It appears that the case we dealt with was only one of several outrages perpetrated by the lad in question and, I might add, not the worst.

In the case mentioned in this thread, he was committed to the Crown Court for sentencing under the dangerousness rules along with the further cases, of which I have no details, nor do I wish to find out.

Thanks for the follow up which brings a conclusion to containing his vile behaviour and to protecting the public hopefully for life.