Posted on 08/12/2005 12:07:43 PM PDT by kiriath_jearim
PET ATTACK: Gun curb call after cat shot
A WOMAN whose beloved cat was shot with an air rifle has branded the perpetrators as "barbaric".
Helen Porter is now too afraid to let her other cats play outside her house in Mewburn, North Bretton, Peterborough, in case they are targeted by gun-wielding youngsters.
Miss Porter (24) was horrified to find her black cat, Jenny, crying in pain outside the back door, with blood running out of her back leg.
She quickly rushed the pet to an emergency out-of-hours vetinary service, just after the incident on Wednesday, August 3, at about 9.45pm.
Luckily, the vets at the city's Broadway clinic, saved Jenny's leg – but she now has to hobble around with a metal plate in it for the rest of her life.
Miss Porter, who has three other cats, has now called for tougher rules on the teenage yobs she believes committed the crime, and for parents to have better control over their children.
She said: "We are now trying to keep our cats in. If these youths are willing to shoot one cat, I am sure they will not care about shooting a second. "What they have done is barbaric and I cannot believe they have done something like this.
"It is easy to say the police should do more to enforce the law, but I do not know what the answer is. "Perhaps one step would be to make sure people are licensed to use every gun, including airguns.
"If I was a parent, I would not allow my children to wander around with airguns."
Miss Porter said she and her partner, Miles Shepherdson (43), often saw teenagers playing with the guns and firing them in the street. She added: "How long is it before these people take a gun into a school and cause someone injury?"
Sarah Cooper, spokeswoman for Cambridgeshire police, said: "We treat all firearms offences as serious offences.
"People do not need a licence to own an air rifle, but if you are caught with one in public and you are misusing it, it will be seized, and you could face up to six months in prison."
To digress somewhat, isn't there a rock song from a few years ago about somebody shooting a rooster? Was it by Alice In Chains?
Giving Copenhagen to cats should be illegal too.
Sounds like these "youngsters" should not be entrusted with guns.
Not that I would know anything about that.
Why? Have scientific tests been done to show it is bad for them?
Serial killers and the like generally start with animals.
Yes, but the song was about vietnam if memory serves me right.
Yes.
And I love cats.
But arrest the kid and punish him (or her).
Why make everybody with a BB gun pay the price for one moron's actions?
Keep your pets indoors and off my yard!
"YEAH, THEY'VE COME TO SNUFF THE ROOSTER HEY YEAHHHHHH!"
(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
was the cat collared and licensed? or was it like most cats that wander around all the time and can be easily taken as alley cats? was it perhaps causing harm to something? destroying property?
i find people who let their cats wander around destroying propety irresponsible. there are a bunch of cats in my neighborhood that like to poop everywhere and dig up flowerbeds.
Yes, "The Rooster" by Alice In Chains, but it was a song about the guitarist's dad's adventures in Vietnam. The Viet Cong tried to kill "the Rooster", but he's a BAMF and "he ain't gonna die".
Must have been pupmed up to the max. The cat was proabably on someones brand new vehicle.
In answer to myself, it is an Alice In Chains song, i.e. "Rooster". Lyric sample:
"Ain't found a way to kill me yet
Eyes burn with stinging sweat
Seems every path leads me to nowhere
Wife and kids household pet
Army green was no safe bet
The bullets scream to me from somewhere
Here they come to snuff the rooster
Yeah here come the rooster
You know he ain't gonna die
Walkin' tall machine gun man
They spit on me in my home land
Gloria sent me pictures of my boy
Got my pills 'gainst mosquito death
My buddy's breathin' his dyin' breath
Oh god please won't you help me make it through"
Four cats running around in town. Crap all over, smell of cat urine all over, foot prints all over the neighbors cars. So I wouldn't bet the farm on it being a "youngster". Maybe $20, but not the farm. My guess is that the city ordnances don't allow the cats to be outside without a leash, but the reporter didn't cover that angle. There are certainly better ways to deal with neighbors that let animals run wild than to shoot the animals though.
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