Animal Legal Defense Fund To Probe Austin County DA Handling of Cat Shooting

On June 26, the Animal Legal Defense Fund issued a press release explaining their intent to review the Austin County District Attorney Office’s handling of the criminal case against Kristen Lindsey.

Animal League Defense Fund

Two useful tags. Click either to see the articles: Toxic to cats | Dangers to cats

Austin County District Attorney Travis J. Koehn has been asked to produce all records under the Texas Public Information Act (Tex. Gov. Code § 552.001 et seq.) after the Texas Grand Jury determined there was “insufficient proof” to charge Kristen Lindsey with animal cruelty.

Since there wasn’t enough evidence provided to charge Lindsey, the case is now considered closed. Now Scott Heiser, former prosecutor and current director of ALDF’s Criminal Justice Program has expressed the desire to examine the case stating:

“The Animal Legal Defense Fund is pleased to see the Austin County District Attorney taking animal cruelty seriously and we are grateful to the members of the Grand Jury for their work as well,” said Scott Heiser, a former prosecutor and current director of ALDF’s Criminal Justice Program.

“Unfortunately, it is possible that the investigation was incomplete and that the prosecution misconstrued Tex. Pen. Code § 42.092(b)(2). We simply want to have a detailed look at the file in an effort to ensure that justice is served.” 

Under the Texas Public Information Act, the prosecutor can refuse to share what is essentially a closed file when a suspect is not convicted. The Animal Legal Defense Fund hopes Austin County District Attorney Koehn won’t exercise his right to do so, and will allow the file to be examined.

The two issues the ALDF hopes to examine are whether the prosecution acted correctly into the legal analysis of the application of the Pen. Code listed above, and whether steps were made during the investigation to try to establish jurisdiction as to where the cat alleged to be Tiger was killed. There are apparently a few witnesses who stated Tiger wasn’t the cat killed, but that shouldn’t determine whether charges should have been filed, as any cat should have been protected under Texas law.

Tiger advocates everywhere are pleased to see the Animal Legal Defense Fund probe into the case, with many feeling the District Attorney’s office did too little to convince the Grand Jury to pursue the case, knowing full well the fault would fall on the Grand Jury, rather than with the District Attorney.

Good luck, ALDF, and may your investigation prove too little was done to bring justice to a little cat named Tiger. Since the case is officially closed, it’s alleged that Lindsey and her attorney are working hard to have as many Facebook pages and groups that gave her a bad name are removed, since she was never charged with a crime.

Please feel free to leave your thoughts on the pitiful manner in which this case has been handled.


Documents and screenshots from throughout this case can be found seen below:

In her blog from 2011, Kristen Lindsey stated she enjoyed killing and trying to kill things (animals):

lindsey-1

Below is the photo that started it all on Facebook:

lindsey-2

Below is her license to practice veterinary medicine in Texas:

lindey-3

Below is a screenshot of her mother’s saying that she and Jack watched:

lindsey-4

For a short time on Saturday, April 18, Kristen at her Facebook page backup and addressed the death threats saying “I’m just ignoring all the death threats. Insulting me doesn’t make you any better:

lindsey-5

Below is a screenshot where Kristen says she’s too awesome to be terminated:

lindsey-6

Below is a reply from Facebook for a photo on Carnivores4Kristen page. Facebook doesn’t consider an arrow through a cat’s head as against their policy:

lindsey-7

Below is a Lindsey press release issued by Austin County district attorney on April 29, 2015:

lindsey-8

Letter from her lawyer:

Letter from lawyer to Texas Board

Source: ALDF

Please search using the search box at the top of the site. You are bound to find what you are looking for.

76 thoughts on “Animal Legal Defense Fund To Probe Austin County DA Handling of Cat Shooting”

  1. Thank God it wasn’t my cat or there would have been way more publication–what kind of veterinarian takes pride in killing any animal?? Poor Tiger and his parents! Please continue with a civil case as animal cruelty is still out of control…

    Reply

Leave a Reply to Dee (Florida) Cancel reply

follow it link and logo