Exactly how and under which provisions of the law is it a crime to kill your own dog with a single bullet to the head?
A pensioner is being prosecuted, it was announced in the news today, for tying his uncontrollable Doberman to a tree in a public place and shooting him (skilfully) with a single bullet to the head, resulting in instant death.
I would be fascinated to know – this information not being available in the newspaper reports – under which law he is being charged. Cruelty to animals? It is not cruel to kill an animal with a single bullet. If that were the case, the police would have to arrest and jail most vets, farmers, rural householders and abattoir employees.
Injured horses are routinely put down with a single shot to the head. It’s the way it’s done. It’s not considered an act of cruelty but an act of necessity, and nobody gets arrested.
Most farmers kill their own dogs, when they get out of hand or too old or ill, in this manner. Again, it’s normal. They don’t go faffing off to the vet to have them put down by lethal injection (as though that is somehow better or any different). That’s what those of us do who don’t have guns.
Rural life involves vets only when productive animals are ill or birthing. Anything else involves a gun or, with newly born puppies and kittens, a bucket of water.
Brutal? No, normal. Normal, that is, for people who have spent their entire lives rearing animals and who are no strangers to the farmyard, cow pen, chicken coop or stables. What we are seeing here is the hysteria of town-dwellers, who would probably pass out if they visit a meat-processing plant with an abattoir at one end and stacks of sausages at the other (I certainly did, and never submitted myself to a repeat experience).
I hope this man has a good lawyer. His arrest is ridiculous and farcical, but in the current atmosphere of dog-and-cat hysteria, there’s no telling what may happen to him.
The animals we own are our chattels. This means we may dispose of them as we please and at will. If we wish to kill the animals we own, for whatever reason and without due justification, we are legally free to do so. This is a basic principle of law.
What we are NOT free to do is to ill-treat our animals or subject them to wanton cruelty. The definition of the law is such that killing them or having them killed does not constitute wanton cruelty. If that were the case, there would be no farms and roast beef would be illegal unless it came from random cows that dropped down dead of a heart attack or old age.
Dogs are not provided for differently under the law to chickens and rabbits. The only reason that pig, goat, sheep and cow owners may no longer kill their own pigs, goats, sheep and cows but must have them slaughtered at the official abattoir is not for the sake of the animals but for the sake of those who buy their meat and eat it. In other words, it is the health and safety of consumers and not the health and safety of the pigs, goats, sheep and cows with which the law concerns itself in saying who is allowed to kill them.
But if you buy a free-range chicken from a farm, expect to see its neck wrung before you. And if you buy a rabbit from somebody who raises them for meat, it will be taken from its cage, its neck will be broken or its head swung against the nearest wall, and then it will be skinned and put in a bag for you. You do not see this process; you just see the dead, flayed rabbit. But is the owner who kills it with a thump to the head and skins it arrested? Of course not. What would Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando eat for Sunday lunch at Il-Barri?
So exactly what are the police claiming here – that this man was arrested and is being prosecuted, with a request for a year in jail, because instead of taking his dog to be killed by a veterinary surgeon, he killed it himself?
Oh, really? I didn’t know there’s a law saying that we are not allowed to kill our own dogs but must take them to the vet to be killed by him or her. I’d like to see this law, but then it doesn’t exist. Dogs are not sold for human consumption, so the provisions on regulated slaughter, which apply to pigs, cows, goats and sheep, do not apply to them.
This man owned a dog. He owns a gun. He had every right to use his gun to shoot his dog. We may not like it, but that’s a different story. The only way in which he broke the law was, possibly, by doing this in a public place, and most certainly by doing it at Buskett, where guns are not allowed. Also, if he did not take the carcass away with him, then he broke the law there too – dumping animal carcasses in a public place – but I believe that’s a contravention rather than a crime.
We really must stop this nonsense. Unless it is specifically provided in the law that certain animals may not be killed by their owners (as with pigs, cows, goats and sheep for human consumption), it is obviously understood that all other animals may be. Interpreting the law as to which animals may or may not be killed by their owners is not up to the discretion of the police and magistrates, whatever the prevailing atmosphere of hysteria may have led them to believe. If we are all to be arrested for shooting our dogs and an occasional horse, then why aren’t we also being arrested for wringing our chickens’ necks or stoving our rabbits’ heads in?
The law is not an ass (good thing too, or somebody might be arrested for shooting it), but the police most certainly are.
Shooting a dog constitutes a criminal act only when the dog you’re shooting is not your own. And the criminal charge in that case is not ‘cruelty to animals’ but destroying another person’s property without his consent – which brings us back to the original premiss of the law: that our dogs are our chattels, not our children. Shooting a dog is not murder but destruction of property. If that property happens to be your own, the police have no business butting in. Yes, dogs have personality, and some of them plenty of it, but apart from our obligation to feed them and avoid cruelty, their status under the law is no different to that of a cupboard.
All I’m doing here is explaining the facts, so any flipped-out ‘animal lovers’ (read, sleeps with 20 cats) who are loading their guns to shoot the messenger had best calm down, make a nice cup of tea, and have a bit of think about why the police should arrest a man who shoots a dog when they don’t arrest a man who wrings a chicken’s neck.
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Indeed
http://www.tubechop.com/watch/2041604
Yes, I remember that drama on BBC Prime, “House of Cards”. The protagonist wasn’t exactly a pleasant man, was he? If I remember correctly, he threw his mistress off a roof top to her death.
And what about dogs euthanised by animal societies such SPCA?
[Daphne – Yes, they were routinely shot until fairly recently, because bullets are cheaper than lethal injections.]
Killing is killing – as long as torture is not present, whether one uses a bullet or an injection is irrelevant. Much ado about nothing…as usual.
The SPCA DOES NOT euthanise animals unless they are already terminal.
[Daphne – The SPCA routinely shot dogs on a systematic ‘clearance’ basis. There was a time not so long ago when it ran the only so-called ‘dogs home’ in Malta and the process was inevitable because they only had that tiny place in Floriana and had to deal with thousands of strays. Now they are fortunate enough to share the burden with other charities, which run sanctuaries, and so no longer have to kill the surplus.]
Even in the USA, where suing for anything and everything is widely practised, the compensation for the accidental killing or injuring of a pet, is limited to its market value rather to its sentimental value.
[Daphne – And closer to home, compensation for the accidental killing or injuring of a human being is, in Malta, limited to his or her market value (earning power calculated across life expectancy). So let’s not be surprised.]
The significant word here is “ownership”. Yes, you “own” a dog and you are responsible for its actions but you don’t fully own an animal. It is not an object. You own a car and you can decide to take a hammer out and bash the bejesus out of it. You can’t do that with a dog because you can’t own another creature be it human or otherwise. Once you “own” a pet, you don’t have carte blanche to do whatever with it. That’s what vets are for and if the pet has a problem, behaviour or otherwise, you take it to the expert to see if there’s a reason bheind the dog’s behaviour. Euthanasia should only be done by a skilled professional, otherwise it gets out of hand. It also protects the owner from court proceedings as in this case. I note you used the word normal several times, I beg to differ, it is not normal.
[Daphne – Your deeply cherished beliefs on whether one may or may not own animals, Challie, are irrelevant to the law, which deals in states of fact. Yes, people can and do own animals and they own them fully, which is why they are bought and sold and why transactions in animals are permitted at law. ‘I took my cow to market’, ‘German pointer puppies for sale’, & c & c.]
Totally agree with Challie.
Albeit evidently the law is lagging far behind ethical standards.
D. Borg, All around us ethical standards are going down the drain. There have been many government decisions which are contrary to basic ethical standards.
Government interference in the tampered meters corruption case is the latest instance. People who corrupted public officials and paid a bribe for a tampered meter will not be prosecuted by order of government.
And you worry about ethical standards on animals.
We have totally lost the plot in Malta. We kick up a fuss about animals and their ‘rights’ and ignore the treatment of illegal immigrants in the detention centres.
If they are black and suffering then its ok – if its furry and has four legs it needs to be treated like royalty.
Our education system has failed us abysmally. Is there any hope for us? I mean really?
Again with the education system! Children’s knowledge of and attitude to animals are entirely shaped in the home.
When I taught in Hamrun twenty-five years ago the boys knew all there was to know about race horses and fighting dogs. In Zurrieq a few years later it was shotguns, bird hunting and trapping and fishing. And good for them! I’d hate to see those vibrant, lively farm children turned into politically correct, dull, milk-and-water circus-haters.
[Daphne – Except for the fighting-dogs, of course. There are some things we really can do without.]
Fighting dogs? Are you serious?
My apologies. I should clarify that it is the farm children I would not see changed one jot – and those were in Zurrieq.
The children in Marsa, on the other hand, were a pitiable bunch. I can’t go into detail, but if you think a fighting dog is scarred you ought to have seen some of the lashes, stab wounds and scars I have seen on their backs, arms and faces. And I was teaching in a primary school at the time.
The legal points are well made, however I think that one has to distinguish between the legal viewpoint and the ethical one.
Is it legal for me to shoot my own dog for no reason whatsoever, except that I’m fed up of it? Sure.
Is it ethical or moral? I would argue that it is not. An animal may not be as intelligent as a human, however I do not see why my compassion for a living, sentient being should be limited by my estimate of its intelligence.
[Daphne – Criminal law should not delve into the ethics and morality of personal choices, which is precisely why adultery is no longer a crime but only a violation of the marital contract, and why there is now all this talk about revising laws which allow the prosecution of women for revealing themselves to paying customers in bars which are open for that specific purpose.]
Besides, Daphne, shooting a dog in the head might be considered humane, but what if you miss? That is exactly what happened in the Star case and look at the furore it caused. Obviously there is a very thin line between humane killing and barbaric slaughter.
[Daphne – If you miss, and the dog takes long to die, or you don’t bother delivering a more accurate shot and putting it out of its misery then yes, you should get done for cruelty. But a competent shot – this dog was killed instantly with a single shot – should not be done for cruelty because there is no difference between this and a lethal injection at the vet’s. If dogs could express a personal preference, most of them would probably choose being shot at Buskett any day over being taken to the vet’s, muzzled, held down on a stainless steel table in a clinical environment smelling of medicines and disinfectant (smells they absolutely abhor) and injected.]
“Criminal law should not delve into the ethics and morality of personal choices”
I see it as the exact opposite. Law, criminal or otherwise, is informed by the changing perception of morality and ethics. It is morality that influences law and not the other way round. It is why slavery is no longer legal and discrimination is punishable at law and women are no longer considered as property.
[Daphne – I speak of the present scenario, and not of the historical reality leading up to it. Malta is a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights and that is the starting-point for all contemporary decisions affecting the law. Or should be.]
What many people fail to realize is that morality changes with time and with culture. Law is always one step behind. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not arguing that this particular individual should be prosecuted. Obviously the judicial system has to move in accordance with the law of the land as precisely as possible. I just wanted to point out that the legal viewpoint is not the be-all and end-all of the entire argument.
As for the dog’s preferred choice, I believe his main preference would be to be allowed to live out his natural life as comfortably as possible, wouldn’t it?
[Daphne – That wasn’t one of the options.]
The European Court of Human Rights is nothing but the end-result of 200 years of enlightenment, crystallized during the disastrous aftermath of the second world war.
It is the crowning achievement of a steady march towards an egalitarian, secular morality and it is the best example I could give of my argument. Evolving morality influencing law.
It is true that we no longer live in a rural environment. We are no longer exposed to the ruthless cruelty of nature because we have progressed enough to build walls protecting ourselves from the distasteful reality. Is this good or bad? You seem to argue that it is bad. I do not believe so.
[Daphne – Oh, it is definitely bad. Divorce from reality is always bad. Ignoring reality, ditto. Serious and credible opinions must always be based on facts. ‘I want to eat meat but I don’t want to know where it comes from’ is definitely problematic. We live in a society that colludes in the self-delusion that meat has nothing to do with animals or death and that it is made in factories. Ironically, it is those who rave most about ‘being natural’ and ‘eating natural’, about breast-feeding and natural childbirth without drugs or assistance because ‘natural is good’ who go craziest when confronted with nature in terms of anything not pretty. Then there are the reverse: people like me, who think that anything completely unnatural in terms of comfort and medical care is utterly fantastic, but who are the same time pretty realistic about what ‘nature’ actually means.]
Civilization is, after all, nothing but the human effort to achieve isolation from the harshness of nature. Society, even more so society governed by rule of law and informed by scientific progress, has no need to remain enslaved to the vagaries of the wild.
[Daphne – Civilisation actually developed as a system to protect us from each other and to make life in such close proximity to Other People halfway tolerable. Nothing to do with the wild at all, other than that we were forced to live with each other to survive in the wild, and then had to find elaborate ways of dealing with each other to prevent wholesale murder and destruction, which broke out all the same from time to time.]
We are no longer inured to death and suffering because we have managed to relegate it to the metaphorical basement, from where the screams cannot be heard. This is giving rise to the new consciousness that non-human animals also experience suffering and pain and that unnecessary killing of animals is also to be avoided.
After all, who can deny that an animal, at the very least the higher-order ones such as most mammals and many birds, have individual personalities of their own, likes and dislikes, as well as a capacity to suffer, physically as well as emotionally, as developed as any human’s?
[Daphne – Well, yes, but the point is missed here that domesticated animals by definition don’t exist in ‘nature’ and that they were domesticated precisely to serve human beings and be killed at the end of it. The bottom line? If meat and leather were banned, there wouldn’t be endless fields full of contented cows living to old age. There would be now cows at all because they would all be shot. The unproductive cow is a liability and a burden. So define ‘unnecessary killing’.]
This is an ongoing process of moral refinement that has been going on since the bronze age.
[Daphne – Not really. It all happened in the last 150 years, with the bulk of it happening in the second half of the 20th century. Before that, it was a free for all of total savagery. Read Godfrey Wettinger’s book on slavery in Malta. As recently as 200 years ago, slaves who revolted were paraded through the streets of Valletta, before crowds which included children, in chains, while torturers armed with red-hot tongs pulled bits of flesh off them and – get this – stuck the same bits of flesh to other parts of their body with boiling tar. Yes, 200 years ago: the BAROQUE AGE. That’s not something Kenneth Zammit Tabona will be putting in his baroque festival, I imagine.]
The unavoidable next step will be, when I do not know, but soon I would wager, to start to codify this new consciousness into law. Some kind of convention for the rights of sentient beings. It sounds like science fiction today, but I’m pretty sure it will happen sooner rather than later.
[Daphne – Rights do not derive from sentience, Bubu. Comatose human beings have exactly the same rights you and I do.]
I know very well what living in the natural state implies, Daphne. I have studied evolutionary biology in some depth and that made me realize that whoever coined the phrase “mother nature” had very little idea what he was talking about. And I never bought into the “natural is good” fad (and incidentally neither did I buy into the GMO hysteria for that matter, but that’s a completely different argument).
As I said in a comment on a previous post I am a realist and I do not expect the entire human race to turn vegan. After all, humans are omnivores and, in the words of Dennis Leary, “meat tastes like murder and murder tastes good”.
I see we do not agree on these points Daphne and that’s OK. I thoroughly enjoyed the discussion and I appreciate the time you put into replying to my comments.
[Daphne – Yes, I enjoyed it too. It made a change from dealing with people who think of themselves as ‘animal lovers’ because they have a cat fixation.]
The Maltese attitude to animals is typical of a post-domestic society – a society that has lost contact with animals and does not see animals mating, being born and dying.
Cats and dogs are no longer treated as animals. They are part of the family. This is anthropomorphism – giving human attributes to animals. Cats and dogs are given names and are allowed to sleep in our beds. We spend a lot of money on their food (which looks like ours), on ‘doctors’ and medicines.
Killing a dog or cat has become murder.
Animals are killed in an abattoir not only because of health and hygiene but because we want the killing of animals to be carried out where we cannot see it.
Vegetarians oppose the killing of animals while non-vegetarians do not want to think about the origin of the meat they are eating. We do not even want to see the cows, chickens, rabbits and pigs on our plates.
The meat we buy does not look at all like an animal. Those parts (skin, head and feet) that would remind us that the meat we are buying was once a living thing are removed and in many cases it is so processed that it does not look like meat at all. The heads, tails and trotters that you will see in many proper butchers shops all over Europe are no longer seen hanging down over butchers’ counters in Malta.
Many children eat burgers and nuggets without being aware that there is meat inside.
I remember animal carcasses hanging on the façades of butcher shops and at the meat stalls at the Valletta market. Back then nobody batted an eyelid or complained.
This ‘nonsense’ will not stop because most urban people cannot or do not want to keep farm animals in their midst. They no longer get their Sunday lunch from a cage in their backgarden or on their roof, or from the yard as they used to do before Malta changed from a domestic to a post-domestic society.
You forgot the ‘pet cemeteries’. Headstones, flowers et al.
My comment to the timesofmalta, which was exactly along these lines, disappeared.
However, looking at the relevant legislation, chapter 439 para 13 (1) does state that unless in an emergency, only a “veterinary surgeon or another competent person” may kill a domesticated animal.
On a related issue, which has already been spoken about here, killing by drowning is also proscribed, also in the same legislation.
[Daphne – Try to find the definition of a competent person. Killing by drowning is cruel because it takes time and involves a struggle, except when they are newborn and die instantly.]
Haha. Touché! I was in fact talking to someone about it, and that’s what I said. There is no definition of competent person in this case.
This is probably to cover the animal welfare idiots, who are in the main unqualified and/or inexperienced, or both, so that they can do whatever they like within the confines of their premises.
This lack of definition obviously cuts both ways, since a farmer would be extremely competent at killing animals, and I doubt anybody would come even close to knowing how to dispatch animals quicker.
Regarding drowning, the law does not distinguish between newborn animals and adult, so it seems that you’d be in trouble regardless of the age of the animal.
My main objection to this DIY method of culling is this: what if the dog didn’t die instantly, but say 30 minutes later of asphyxia, or shock?
[Daphne – Then that would be a separate issue. The principle is the same as allowing people to open restaurants but then prosecuting those who don’t do it right and give their clients food poisoning. Incidentally, killing one’s pet is not, strictly speaking, culling.]
I think the point is not about animals being culled by different means, being a bullet, an injection or some other device, but that this is done professionally, by someone who is skilled at this practice, like a butcher or a vet.
[Daphne – A butcher is not more competent to kill a dog than somebody who is a trained shot. Rather the opposite. You really don’t want to see your dog being killed by a butcher.]
Dogs are no different than cattle or horses when it comes to ownership and finally it is owner who has the last say when it comes to deciding then these should be put down, unless there are serious welfare or public health reasons to do so. However it’s is the owner’s responsibility that this is done in a way which is the least conducive to causing unnecessary suffering and distress.
[Daphne – I agree with you. And that is exactly why people who are trained shots (you have to be a trained shot to hold a gun licence) tend to dispatch their own animals everywhere in the civilised world. ]
Though legally, yes, this man did not break any law in choosing this method for disposing of his property, and the only infringements being related to the use of a shotgun in a public place and for not disposing of the carcass, however, as a citizen I would be concerned about the way in which this person has abused the licence granting him possession of this weapon. I am very concerned about the fact that once this person made up his mind, all he had to do is reach for his weapon. What if next time it’s about an argument with a neighbour?
[Daphne – The problem with this last argument of yours is that you start off from the premiss that it perfectly all right for him to kill birds with that gun, but not his dog. I don’t make that differentiation. Nor do I assume that anyone who dispatches his dog in this manner will do the same to a person. Plenty of people have been shot in Malta during arguments, precisely because the ownership of hunting-guns is so widespread, but there appears to be no way of knowing beforehand who will lose his rag and start shooting and who will not.]
Culling is the putting-down of “wild” countryside (not domestic) animals in relatively large numbers, either because of an increase in number or because of inbreeding. Case in point was the culling of badgers in UK in certain shires because of complaints by farmers. The numbers of badgers to be culled initially was about 80 this year and 100 in 2015.
As usual, the only voice of sanity on this godforsaken rock.
So that’s why womens are subjected to mental and/or physical abuse or even murder – the operative word is “chattels”.
[Daphne – DING DONG. Women actually were chattels under the law and revision of the law in fairly recent times can do little to eradicate a mentality that is the result of millenniums of behavioural programming.]
millenniums ? that still used ?
[Daphne – Yes; it’s the most favoured plural, though not in Malta where we speak a strange form of English that is semi-archaic and semi-gibberish: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/09/science/60-behind-every-second-millenniums-of-history.html?_r=0 ]
I think you mean millenia. Learn to spell.
[Daphne – Both ‘millenniums’ and ‘millennia’ are correct, but ‘millenia’ most definitely is not. I favour the plural ‘millenniums’ as I do ‘forums’ and ‘referendums’ because all these words are fully integrated into English and the English plural form makes more sense than the false Latin plural. Latin nouns are declined, which is why ‘millennia’ is a false plural. To be truly Latin, it would have to be declined on the basis of the part it plays in the syntax of a sentence.]
Remarkable retort.
Seems Christina is not amused by sheer logic.
And more so even when relationships break up – “if I ( the male) cannot have you, nobody will ! ” Bang, bang, game over !
Aren’t you missing the wood for the trees with this story? I get the following out of the story: Dotty old man goes to Malta’s one and only public park which happens to be a nature reserve. Old fool enters public park with loaded weapon and proceeds to blow his dog’s brains out in front of picnicking families with small children. Police arrest the nut job and are prosecuting him. My reaction: I would be surprised if they didn’t prosecute him. In fact the police would be derelict if they did nothing.
[Daphne – If you read my post again, you will see that this is in fact what I wrote: that his only real wrong-doing was in shooting the dog in 1. a public place, and 2. an area in which guns are banned (Buskett), and that animal cruelty should not be the point. People of 63 are neither dotty nor old fools, necessarily, which is why there are so many in the cabinet of ministers. The man probably did it because he doesn’t have the luxury or a garden or field of his own and you can hardly shoot a dog in your kitchen. Also, it is most unlikely that he did it in front of picnickers and the presence of children is irrelevant to the law, which is why when men murder the mothers of their children in front of those children, you never hear the fact being taken into account. Exposing your penis to a child is a specific crime, but exposing the child to the murder of its mother is not.]
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20140217/local/police-to-arraign-man-who-shot-dog.507220
According to this report it happened in Wied il-Ghasel in Mosta which is not a public park not in Buskett.
[Daphne – An original report yesterday said it was Buskett, and I am glad to hear that it wasn’t, because this makes his case even stronger.]
I read the news reports after reading your blog and the deed does appear to have taken place in Wied il-ghasel, limits of Mosta at a time when the place was deserted. Still a public place used by the public to go out walking or jogging. The not so old man (63) left the animal’s carcass tied to a tree to be found by the next person out for a morning walk. Did he think that vultures would swoop down and pick the carcass to bones before the next person on an island 9 x 19 with a population of over 400,000 came along? Dog also had microchip embedded allowing owner to be traced. Man lacks judgment to say the least.
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20140217/local/police-to-arraign-man-who-shot-dog.507220
Just read the posts under the news item.
[Daphne – I’d rather not. Any further evidence of the complete irrationality, poor powers of analysis, over-emotive displays and genetically-transferred low intelligence quotient of a disproportionate number of Maltese people is enough to ruin my week. It’s as though Maltese society is dominated by the sort of trailer trash who go on live television elsewhere to make a spectacle of their ignorance, except that here that kind of reasoning is considered normal even for the supposedly privileged.]
Wow, Daphne. Happy to see you got that off your chest. Love it.
Is-sitwazzjoni hija cara bizzejjed biex nindunaw li l-pulizija trid turi li qieghda taghmel ix-xoghol sew. Qeghdin attenti hafna biex ma jintrifsux saqajn Laburisti. Allura nuru gustizzja ma l-annimali biex naghlqu halq kullhadd.
You might be right about the law but that doesn’t make it right.
I don’t believe people should be killing animals as, when and how they see fit. It’s barbaric.
[Daphne – No, it’s not barbaric. It’s normal life. An animal is an animal is an animal and while you are free to make your own personal value judgements on whether you wish to eat meat or poison mice or not, surely you can see that the imposition of a legal regime banning the rest of us from doing it would be insane. These are matters of personal choice and should not be imposed. In any case, cows only exist for meat, milk and leather – if there were a universal blanket ba on the consumption of all three, there would NO cows. As for killing animals when and how we see fit, I trust you are not suggesting an official rabbit and chicken abattoir where all chickens and rabbits on the island must be taken for ‘official killing’. Imagine that.]
Normal and barbaric are not mutually exclusive, Daphne.
Many, if not most, animal-killing practices are unacceptably cruel, thus making them barbaric.
[Daphne – The most barbaric animal slaughter I have seen, paddy, was in a highly regulated, super-clean and efficient, meat processing plant in northern Italy. I am not usually lost for words, but I literally cannot describe the horrible feeling in that vast hangar full of cows standing with resignation, fear spread all over the faces, in snaking queues between barriers, then being killed with a dart to the head and dropping off on a conveyor belt. In the next hangar: the enormous carcasses of cows hanging by a hook through the neck, on conveyor-rail suspended from the ceiling, while immigrant workers put their hands up the carcass’s anus, with their arms right up the gut, and hauled out the faeces. They spend all day, every day, doing only that. But that isn’t cruelty to people: it’s employing them. In the hangar after that: the carcasses are butchered. At this point I was led away by the nice man in charge of the party, who noticed that I was upset, though I didn’t know what upset me most: the sight of the cows lining up which brought mental flashes of a concentration camp, or the thought of those immigrant workers pulling sh*t out of dead cows for nine hours a day, five days a week, year upon year of their lives.]
They are also very commonly applied, thus making them normal. Drowning young animals is normal, as in common or widespread, but it is cruel nonetheless. Large-scale animal slaughter systems are based on expediency ie cost-efficiency considerations but many of them are obviously also cruel. Slaughter setups that operate illegally are obviously worse still and yet there are so many of them that, at a stretch, they too might be considered ‘normal’.
Killing animals as and when might be judged “normal” by some, but not by me.
As far as the killing of rabbits and chickens goes. I certainly don’t want to see them killed and skinned in the middle of the street as used to happen in the past.
[Daphne – That’s exactly the point Paul P made in my Top Comment post today: people today are divorced from the reality of where their meat comes from. They know it involves butchery, but they’d rather pretend it doesn’t happen, and so they insist that it doesn’t happen where they can see it.]
I tend to agree with you on the subject Daphne, however please note that although many farmers do breed their own animals for meat this is not legally allowed in many European countries unless these animals are registered and then slaughtered at an approved abattoir.
[Daphne – It’s no different in Malta, Denis. It’s very tightly regulated.]
This is to control the food chain for any contamination by deseased animals. Food chain animals are slaughtered in abbatoirs for the sake of quality and hygenic control, even if this does not happen all the time.
Many private breeders keep their animals in atrocious conditions which if seen will definitely put many people off eating such meat.
Very few private breeders would pass hygenic tests, to me a badly kept animal is poor, foul quality meat.
Daphne, I believe that you are wrong in the interpretation of law here. Your article certain makes lots of sense. I was the first person to condemn this man but on second thoughts, I think I would do the same if my dog attacked me (and Dobermann Pinschers are known to attack their owners on occasion).
A lawyer once said to me that nobody has the right to kill a dog (this discussion came up after a farmer I knew shot and killed 3 dogs after they wreaked havoc when they jumped into his yard and killed 140 fowl (chickens, guinea fowl, ducks, etc)). Apparently he had no right to do so. The law only permits such a “victim” to capture the dogs and sue their owners for damages.
[Daphne – You are confusing the legal issues. I explained that exact same point in my post: dogs are the property of their owners. The reason you can’t just shoot a dog that steals your chickens is because that dog is somebody else’s property and you can’t destroy it. While the owner of the dog is responsible at law to the damage to your chickens and must face prosecution and a civil suit from you for compensation, you will similarly face criminal charges for destroying the dog that belonged to him and he can sue you for its market value in the civil courts. If it had no market value, then you have no civil case, but the police are still obliged to prosecute if they have enough proof that he destroyed your property (dog) regardless of its value.]
Well said!
This reminds me of that story where cats were going missing and a Chinese man was suspected of killing them for consumption. Allegedly he was selling them to restaurants.
I didn’t follow the outcome of that story, but remember thinking how hypocritical animal activists were – they were livid when the story broke, not because they could’ve been the unsuspecting consumers of cat meat, but because of those poor cats.
[Daphne – It was actually worse, not so much about animal activism as about racism and hostile stereotyping. He was Chinese, had a van and was seen around cats, therefore he must be collecting them and turning them into food. Then it turned out that he was actually feeding them, and that the carcasses the police found were rabbits – ah, so that’s all right then. RABBITS. We eat those. It’s all right to kill them. Unlike cats, they don’t have feelings. Honestly, some people.]
What about chickens, pigs cooked whole on the spit, rabbit stew with the head included?
Those animal ‘lovers’ almost put some Chinese restaurants out of business when the story broke and they even went as far as boycotting one of them, though they didn’t have a shred of evidence and decided to outsmart both health and safety and the police in their investigations.
I wouldn’t like to eat a cat, in the same way I wouldn’t like to eat a rat or a hedgehog, but I could never claim my reluctance is due to cruelty issues in the sourcing of that protein to eat.
It seems as far as animal activists are concerned, the animal kingdom is entirely populated by cats and dogs. A Bengal tiger kept as a pet in a household in Mosta? Who cares! Overbreeding of snakes? Ma x’biza! Shackled exotic parrots in cages? But they’re not so cute, ta.
The least they could do for their animal kingdom cause is lobby the government to ban Alaskan malamutes from being imported to heatwave Malta. Now that’s cruelty.
The Animal Welfare Act says
13.1 except in cases of emergency which visibly indicate extreme pain conducive to death, only a vet or another competent person shall be permitted to kill an animal of a domesticated breed.
I can’t see the definition of “competent person”.
[Daphne – Exactly. If you’re a trained shot then you’re a competent person. The whole point to that law is avoiding cruelty through prolonged pain in death. And the terminology really exposes confused attitudes towards animals. They had to specify ‘domesticated breed’ because otherwise we would all be up on charges of poisoning mice and rats and what would you do about bird-shooters? But that means exotic pets fall into the same category too. So under this law, the police can’t arrest that man with the tiger should he choose to shoot it, but they feel they have room for interpretation allowing them to arrest a man who killed his dog by shooting it cleanly through the head, which is exactly what the SPCA used to do for years.]
According to the Animal Welfare Act, in the preliminary section:
‘”competent person” means those individuals designated as such by the Minister for any purposes of this Act”.
The thing is that we can never be reasonably sure that a dog or a cat will be killed humanely if this is done by an untrained and inexperienced person.
A case in point is the widespread drowning of kittens, which many think is humane. According to the RSPCA, however,
“‘Death by this method is neither quick nor painless. It would have caused considerable suffering and panic would have ensued when they were put into the water.’ (they were referring to a specific case).
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1316841/Housewife-drowned-cats-baby-bath-afford-phone-RSPCA.html
[Daphne – Yes, they are right about the drowning. I’ve seen it done with cats. The animal flounders and struggles and tries to come up for air, and it really isn’t ideal at all, but then again, it only takes a minute – which is a minute too long. The newborn die instantly, and its the newborn which are routinely killed this way. Quite frankly, I would rather this than the other commonly practised method of throwing them into some field, where they are going to die anyway, but a more prolonged death. There is no way you are going to convince people who kill chickens by wringing their necks and rabbits by stoving their head in every day that they should drive their newborn kittens to the vet to have them put down formally – and quite frankly, their reasoning is logically correct. Whether we like it or not is a different matter.
And yes, I happen to agree with you that “we can never be reasonably sure that a dog or a cat will be killed humanely if this is done by an untrained and inexperienced person”, but somebody who is able to bring down a bird flying far overhead is able to shoot a dog in the head cleanly at a few paces. That unpleasant business with the dog shot and buried still alive was an exception, clearly – and there was something wrong with both the man and the gun as I recall. For a start, he didn’t even deliver a second shot. In any case, this is academic because most people who own dogs don’t also own gun or hold gun licences. People who are licensed to own a gun are trained shots.]
You are 100% right on this. Hope this man sticks up for himself. Nostalgia for the old rural farming life is for those who never experienced it first hand.
[Daphne – It’s not ‘old’ at all. It’s current. I speak from experience, having lived in a farming community for most of my adult life. My neighbours invariably thought I was overly sentimental in taking my dogs to the vet when they were ill. What you do is bring out your gun and shoot it, you see – because there is no point in spending money or time or effort curing a non-productive animal when a replacement can be had for free. And if your bitch inconveniently produces a litter, you don’t go on Facebook fussing about looking for homes – you get a bucket of water and drown them as them come out. This happens routinely. I am not saying here that I approve or disapprove, but I’m just stating facts. The only exceptions are well-trained hunting hounds, because effort is required in training a new one, so you might as well try to save the one you have. And if you let your dog get into somebody’s property or if they suspect it of taking their chickens, that dog will be shot or disappear mysteriously.]
Oh yes quite. By ‘old’ I meant that poetic tinge one normally associates with the romanticized simple way of life of days gone by. You reminded me of a very popular Canadian book critic who made your exact point.
While not quoting exactly his words were of the sort that there was nothing romantic about life on a farm. Far from it. It’s cruel, rough and hard by city folk standards.
We tend to forget that and only see the cute white cuddly woolly lamb while conveniently forgetting how the sizzling lamb chops scottadito journey starts in the first place.
I totally agree with Daphne. This is just what I thought when I heard the news. What if the dog had injured the owner as they sometimes do, or was of danger to the family and neighbors, wouldn’t the dog have been ordered to be put down?
Well he did it skillfully himself before it became a danger to society. The dog didn’t suffer, it died instantly. Every case has to be taken on its own merit.
Does he have any proof that the dog was “a danger to society” ?
If he has no proof whatever he says to justify killing it is worth nothing.
[Daphne – Chris, you can take your dog to the vet to have it put down any time you like. You don’t have to prove that it is either ill or dangerous. Some vets may have issues about doing this, but there is nothing in the law to stop it, and there shouldn’t be.]
Yes Daphne I agree. But a vet is trained to do this, has a licence to treat animals and has standards.
I don’t know, maybe its because i’ve never lived in a farm, but I think these things should be left in the hands of professionals like a vet.
[Daphne – Chris, a trained shot is a trained shot, whether what he shoots is a bird flying high overhead or a dog at 50 paces. How do you think the rabbits you eat are killed? I’ll describe the process. A member of the household reaches into the cage, pulls one out, slams its head against the nearest wall or wrings its neck, then skins it instantly. And presto, you have the main ingredient for your fenkata.]
My mother never bought rabbits dead and flayed (or skinned?) but it was up to my father to do the dastardly deed – a punch just below the neck.
Then, as they have to be skinned asap, yours truly (out of five siblings) was roped in to do the holding while my father did the pulling.
When my father could no longer continue due to arthritis, I stepped in and as none of my siblings wanted to help (eat the spaghetti and “stuffat”, yes, though) I had to make do with two nails (“grampuni”) stuck firmly in the wall.
It was the same with the Christmas turkey – it’s not a one-man job, as one kick from the turkey and you risk having an artery in your thigh punctured. This was not the Victorian age but up to the late Sixties, even early Seventies.
And no, I am not a farmer but have just finished doing forty years in financial services (including the golden eighties, suspensions, strikes, Mnarja and all, including Denis Sammut as Executive Director.)
“slams its head against the nearest wall ”
Thanks for that. I’ll probably never eat rabbit again now.
[Daphne – Exactly how did you think rabbits are killed, Chris? By being stroked to death? Given an overdose of paracetemol washed down by a glass of whisky? Or maybe you thought they live out their days in green fields and when they get old and die in a bed of buttercups, a nice old lady waves a magic wand over them and they turn into a fenkata.]
My grandma refused to buy her rabbits and chickens dead.
I remember the same trusted farmer coming to her house early Saturday afternoon holding a sack, walking straight to the garden and proceeding to kill whatever she chose.
In the Act – “competent person” means those individuals designated as such by the Minister for any purposes of this Act.
[Daphne – Ah, ministerial discretion again. How exhausting.]
So it can’t be the Minister who underestimates the time it takes to have funding programmes researched, written, checked and approved, because that renders him incompetent and hardly eligible to determine who qualifies as a ‘competent person’.
The law on aninmal welfare has been mentioned previously. Now what can be more cruel than coldblooded murder?
In this case, the newspaper report states that the accused admitted the charges.
[Daphne – The accused admitted shooting the dog, which is not the same thing as admitting the charges. The definition of murder does not encompass animals, neither as perpetrators nor as victims. David, I recently suggested you widen your knowledge base by finding out how animals are killed for meat. You really should, you know. Some people become vegetarians after this experience. Others, like me, just never repeat it.]
I am relying on the newspaper report which stated that the case for deferred for sentencing (or punishment) as the person admitted he is guilty as charged.
The laws need to change.
What right does he think he has to decide to kill a healthy dog just because the dog is ‘too much to handle’ ? The attack couldn’t have been that serious anyway as he was healthy enough to tie the poor animal to a pole and mercilessly shoot it.
How can he sleep at night knowing what he did ?
I’m not disputing your points as I don’t really know what the law is and isn’t but if it is like you say it is then the a change in the laws regarding animal welfare is long overdue.
[Daphne – You don’t need to know the law, Chris. Just use your head. When a chicken is killed so that you can eat it, the owner has a right to kill it, and you have a right to eat it, and by definition it must be healthy otherwise it would be unfit for consumption.]
“the owner has a right to kill it”
Fair enough, but wouldn’t the farmer/breeder of any type of animal which is destined for human consumption need to have some sort of licence which is only given if certain standards are met ?
[Daphne – Chris, please. This is one of the most tightly regulated fields in Malta. Instead of coming here to ask silly questions, do some research yourself. You are a grown-up.]
I know these are two completely different things, but the chap who shot the dog did so entirely out of his own judgement without seeking permission and applying his own standards (which i have to admit are much fairer than some other animal killers we have been hearing of recently)
What permission?
OK, so he seems to have pulled a gun in public, but that’s the only law he broke.
[Daphne – And apparently not even that, because he did it in Wied il-Ghasel (the reference to Buskett was mistaken) and he has a gun licence.]
If the dog attacked him, let us please see the damage.
Sorry Daf, but on this I cannot agree with you.
[Daphne – I know you don’t. Or views on whether dogs should be kept alive when nobody wants them are different. In that situation I don’t think it’s cruel to put them down, but cruel to keep them alive.]
This was an honorable act. A grown-up man who took care of his problem. It is quite normal thing in the UK, that people who had the same issue, dealt with it in a similar manner. Those who did not went to the vet. I do not think this was criminal or cowardly towards the dog. It was his dog, his responsibility, and when you love that dog/animal and circumstances dictate otherwise, who else ought to deal with the problem?
Sorry Mrs Galizia but you are talking as if an animal would not deserve a decent death?
[Daphne – On the contrary, Linda. I said that dogs deserve a decent death, and that to a dog, being shot once through the head while out in the open air, by somebody it knows, is infinitely preferable to being dragged to a vet’s clinic, full of alien, hostile smells of chemicals, knowing it faces Something Bad, and being injected to death by a doctor in a white coat.]
If shooting an animal is ok, then is strangling also or lighting it to fire or electrocuting it? Or drowning it in a bucket full of water as you say.
[Daphne – Again, I did not say that. Your confusion arises from the fact that you don’t understand how shooting through the head causes instant death. It is nothing akin to being strangled, set alight, drowned or electrocuted. Do go easy on the hysteria because it never helps anyone’s furtherance of an argument.]
We don’t live in the wild west where shooting of dogs should be “normal” as you say.
[Daphne – Shooting old, ill or dangerous dogs is not ‘the wild west’, Linda. It is normal practice throughout the civilized world. Surely you don’t imagine that in countries much larger than ours, where the nearest vet might be a 50 to 100 miles away, people call out the vet to administer a lethal injection when they can simply shoot the animal? Not only is it considered ridiculous, but it is thought worse than ridiculous: an irresponsible waste of the vet’s precious time, time which is best devoted to treating sick animals. Unfortunately you do not seem to understand that dogs were never intended as pets in the meaning of ‘living toy’, but were domesticated as working companions and that is what they still are on farms all over the world. This is not immediately evident in mongrels, but it is instantly evident in breeds developed over centuries to serve a particular purpose. You also can’t understand how the owners of such dogs form an attachment to them and yet still are able to shoot them when they become too old to work, too ill, or turn aggressive. But it happens. Only town-dwellers have the luxury of frivolity. Farm-owners have to be pragmatic.]
How do you know the dog was “uncontrollable”? He could have been rehomed if the owner could not cope with it.
[Daphne – I did not say the dog was uncontrollable. I passed no comment on the reason why he shot it, because I happen to be of the opinion that it is nobody’s business. The point at issue here is whether he should have shot his own dog. I say why not, given that he is a trained shot, holds a gun licence, and the dog knew him well. But he should have removed the carcass and given it a decent burial. If he had cleaned up after him, there wouldn’t have been this ridiculous hoo-ha. I can’t believe he didn’t know what a microchip does. And if he thought what he did was wrong, and was a lying sort, he wouldn’t have said he was the one who did the shooting, when the police rang. It isn’t as though anyone saw him. He must have thought the police rang to say that his dog had been found shot, and did he know about it, and he said ‘yes, I did it, don’t worry’. You have no idea what the police are like.]
Animal rights in Malta are so behind to Northern Europe for instance that people like you should not defend savages who shoot their pets in public place.
[Daphne – In Northern Europe, Linda, farmers and country-dwellers shoot their own dogs and many other animals besides. You do not call a vet out for 100 miles in 20 degrees below zero to put a bullet through your dog’s or horse’s head when you can do it yourself. What does ‘public place’ have to do with it, exactly? Would it have made a difference to you had he done it in his bathroom?]
Did this man have a legal right to carry a gun? Guns are for certain purpose, licences are handed out surely NOT for shooting your pets?!
[Daphne – Yes, he had a licence. A gun licence is a gun licence. What you may or may not do with your gun is regulated by the law, not by the gun licence.]
But how is shooting at, and killing, a bird acceptable, while shooting at and killing a dog is criminal?
Xi dwejjaq ta’ pajjiz.
The only difference between a “clean shot” and a lethal injection is that a gun is associated with murder and a syringe is associated with medicine. To the animal killed it would make no difference.
[Daphne – To my mind, the associations made with lethal injections are pretty terrible, much worse than with a gun: extermination camps, Nazi experiments, executions in Texas, Chinese treatment of political prisoners, and so on. I can’t for the life of me imagine why so many people think it more ‘humane’ to have a distressed dog taken to disinfected clinic – dogs absolutely hate going to the vet, however nice the vet is – and injected to death when it can be shot in the open air.]
Yes, I agree. I meant to say that it is the association most people make.
Well prima facie, any arrest and prosecution would have been more in relation to the firearm.
It had to be established if it was duly registered and licensed, whether the owner himself was licensed. It was discharged in a public place.
This is a two-pronged argument having two scenarios. For reasons of sentiment, compassion and maybe other considerations many opt to centre the spotlight on the dog being put down.
Yes indeed Daphne, much of what you said is indeed first hand experience of those being reared in a distant rural environment where such experiences are now considered unorthodox, inhuman and non civilised. Yet it is very civilised for someone to own a Kalashnikov and discharge twenty rounds on a human being.
What is exactly the point you are trying to make?
He had a right to shot his dog? Where did you find this guy? Is he some sort of pseudo-liberal-academic? What the heck!! I do not give a hoot if he was legally right… There are more humane ways of doing that..Moreover he could have simply taken it to a sanctuary!!
He was barbaric and deserves to be punished for it!!
The Animal Welfare Act of 2002 Page 5, 13 (1) Killing of Animals
Except in cases of emergency which visibly indicate extreme pain conducive to death, only a veterinary surgeon or another competent person shall be permitted to kill an animal of a domesticated breed or any wild animal which has been domesticated, except animals bred for the production of food.
The act continues also specifying methods allowed by law to kill an animal in an emergency by a lay person. Reason behind this is that a lay person very likely does not know the correct way to do it quick and painless, such as was the case with Star who had to suffer for days before she died, because the person had no clue on how to kill an animal quick and painless.
If I may point out a journalist would do his homework and find out what the law says rather than pose the question to the public.
[Daphne – Because some people set fire to the house while frying chips, Christina, it does not follow that all people should be banned from frying chips. Because one man messed up shooting a dog in the head, it does not follow that trained and accurate shots, who can pick a bird out of the sky, should be banned from dispatching their dogs with a single shot, which is exactly what this man did – according to the prosecuting officer himself. If you think that the law is there to make the death of animals quick and painless, kindly explain why it refers only to domestic animals. If ‘quick and painless’ were the real issue here, we would not have abattoirs. Or don’t you know what happens at abattoirs?]
Sorry ta’, Now this person couldn’t control the dog.????And why he didn’t seek the police??????Come on you think that this man did it because his dog turned on him? For me it’s a lie
[Daphne – This is not somebody’s Facebook timeline. Please write coherently and do not use more than one interrogation mark. Otherwise, thank you for commenting.]
what disaster this is your writing Carmen, i have to use the facebooktionary to understand what you says, sweet. U by the way, nice pic hi.
Dear Police Commissioner,
A small mouse is running loose in my home and it is driving my wife nuts. She says that she cannot live in the same house as a mouse. So she will leave until the mouse is legally exterminated. So can you kindly dispatch some of your best marksmen (licensed to kill), to do the job.
And bring me a take-away while you’re at it.
First and foremost dogs are animals and thus it is quite common to lose control of the animals. Just Google “dogs attacking children” and you will read plenty of articles. Case in point recent killing. Google Lexi Branson.
Secondly, why would this guy need to seek the police force.
Finally how are you so sure that he is lying?
Do you have proof that he’s lying?
And do you really need to justify the shooting of your own dog?
Was the man assisted by a lawyer during the court proceedings?
[Daphne – Yes.]
If killing a dog with a single shot to the head is considered cruelty to animals, then what can be said of abattoirs for example.
Most people tend to see this as animal cruelty only because a dog was involved. Some of the ‘animal lovers’ lurking around would not give a damn if this guy killed a snake, because a snake is not cute.
Guess that some people are under the impression that all the animals we eat die of old age or disease, or are killed by professional, authorised people by humane means. Do you really believe that the farmer living down the road goes to the vet to have a rabbit killed for a fenkata?
I would urge most of the people to find out how animals are killed in an abattoir – you don’t have to go there, not that you would be permitted. Just do your research on the internet, and you might well never eat meat again.
Cruelty towards animals should not take into account what kind of animal you ended up killing. If killing a cow with one single shot to the head is not considered as cruelty then I would guess that killing a dog in the same manner should not count as cruelty.
I believe that what one would do with the carcass would not come into picture when judging whether you killed it in a cruel manner or not.
But once again guess that we ended up humanising animals (like the guy who earlier said that if a person managed to kill a dog what would stop him from killing a person).
What would we have said if this dog went on to attack someone? He would have probably been accused of gross negligence for not putting the animal down knowing that it had attacked its owner.
Probably he killed the dog out of a sense of responsibility and with a heavy heart.
Your point regarding the law makes sense. However animals at the vet or on a farm are euthanized precisely to end their suffering owing to one malady or another. More often than not the circumstances are regretful and heart breaking.
In this case the animal had a clean bill of health.
If it were so simple for this man to kill his pet dog whom he loved according to his own words, then I dread to think about the cruelty the hapless creature was subjected to during its entire life. Speculation you might say, but I’ll bet my bottom dollar.
It’s all a question about morals while the law, as the saying goes, is an ass.
A. Cremona,
1. Vets may legally kill a perfectly healthy animal, and often do.
2. Farm animals are not euthanized. All the farm animals that are killed for human consumption must enjoy perfect health, otherwise the government would shut the place down.
Completely agree with Daphne here, but I think that he broke the law regarding the use of his gun “to shoot his dog” since gun licences are issued following examinations under precise categories and for uses clearly defined by law: target shooting at a range only, hunting (shotguns), clay pigeon shooting, collector’s licence. Simply owning a gun does not give anyone the right by law to shoot and kill a dog. I can completely empathise with his situation, but…
If he used a shot gun, it was no straight bullet to the head.
This man is known for animal cruelty.
NAZI captain shoots young jewish boy with a straight bullit to the head.
The captain is a professional shooter,therfore it was not cruel.
The question here is the, WHY? Why did he shoot it?
And him saying that the dog attacked him,is simply CRAP.
So,first a dog attacks you(,his loving owner),then you attach a leash to his collar,tie him to a tree and then shoot him.
Dan bis-serjeta jew?
[Daphne – It is deeply wrong on several counts to compare the shooting of a boy by a Nazi officer to the shooting of a dog by its owner. For a start, it belittles the former action and reduces in value the life of a boy to the life of a dog, thereby also reducing the magnitude of the crime.]