This is a follow up page on a well-publicised story from April. It is nice to follow up on cat abuse stories when the ending is relatively happy. We like happy endings when justice is done [see original page].
Queensland, Australia: For the fun of it (and because he hates cats) Samuel Conroy hurled a cat, Marcello, over a fence and against an adjacent house. It was quite a distance (around 20 feet). Marcello, a grey-and-white, medium longhaired random bred cat, has regained his health having made 27 visits to the vet and having lost his right eye and having suffered three sessions of stress-induced flu.
He looks pretty well in the photo. Often we don’t know what happened to ‘the cat’. The news reporting usually focuses on the perpetrator of the crime.
Convicted and Sentenced
As for the criminal, he was found guilty and convicted of animal cruelty and sentenced to 12 months probation, 120 hours of community service and banned from owning a pet for five years. He was also fined AUS$1,100. Some would argue that he deserved a stiffer sentence. His youth and apology might have helped in mitigation.
The callousness of Conroy, a teenager, is confirmed by the fact that he laughed uncontrollably after he had hurled Marcello at the house. He later apologised but being a somewhat cynical geriatric I don’t think it was said with sincerity.
He said:
“It was a case of me letting my anger take over, rather than using my brain…I tried getting it out of our yard and onto the roof, but missed the distance….I started feeling sorry for it, so I took it inside, fed it and gave it some water. The fact is no one in our household likes cats. We don’t want it as a pet.”
So he wanted to hurl the cat onto the neighbouring house’s roof! Great. Nice excuse Conroy.
Adoption
It seems that Marcello is yet to be adopted into a loving home. As he is a little apprehensive it should be quiet without dogs and young kids. He is a young cat at 15-months-of-age. He’s also handsome and there is a lucky person out there waiting to adopt him.
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The apology was a lawyer prepared apology to mitigate the brutality he exhibited. It’s also worth pointing out that boys of this age do not have good frontal lobe development and while it’s no excuse it is the duty of the parental units to be aware of anger issues and other behavioral problems in their children and guide them though it.
Children abusing animals can be a sign of mental illness or being abused themselves.
Despite what he did the fact he was able to show some compassion by bring it in after injuring the cat shows some hope.
Thanks ME. It is very disturbing to see a teenager be this cruel to an animal. And as you say it is a sign of mental illness. I think you have to be mentally ill to do something like that.
I always say no one operates in a vacuum. Perhaps this time his heart opened a bit. I repeat I don’t like dogs one tiny bit but rely on our shabby AC control to handle things as well as other aspects of the law that can be used to make unruly neighbors tidy up their act.
I have pepper sprayed my SIL’s dogs in the past which is a valid defense and considering I had the right to shoot them on the spot for menacing me in my own driveway a reasonable reaction.
Perhaps this man should do his community service in a cat shelter and then be required to give public speeches over what he has learned from his experience.
If this is your reaction to a cat in your yard how do you handle real life stress Mr. Conroy.