Sing Sing guard gets year in jail for killing 5 kittens

News Radio 88 ^ | 3/22/02

[areafiftyone]

White Plains, New York-AP) -- A former prison guard who killed five kittens in a trash compactor at Sing Sing has been sentenced to a year in jail. A judge said the crime was ``so offensive and so calculated and so gratuitously cruel it diminishes the humanity of everybody.''

Forty-eight-year-old Ronald Hunlock had been convicted of aggravated cruelty to animals. Last March he found an inmate with contraband at the Sing Sing Correctional Facility in Ossining. He then searched the inmate's cell, found five newborn kittens and their mother and told the inmate to put them in the compactor. The inmate refused, so Hunlock did it himself.

The mother cat escaped but the kittens were crushed. Defense attorney Daniel Gallivan had asked the judge not to impose jail time, and said Hunlock thought the cats were ill and had no other recourse.

[Sangamon Kid]

Deviant is how I would describe any one who would do this to five kittens.

Deviant - yes. Criminal - no.

[Sangamon Kid]

...he should have been sentenced to having his hand stuck in the same trash compactor and see what it felt like to be crushed.

And stooping to his level, you would be just as cruel and cold-hearted.

[Renatus]

I HATE cats; therefore this incident doesn't bother me at all except the jail sentence for the guy that compacted the cats. God gave man dominion over beasts, especially cats.

[conserv13]

Reading all these posts, I can't believe that there are people here that believe cruelty to animals should go unpunished.
Animals are not property, they are living beings, cats are mammals (like us) who feel pain just like we do, when they get crushed in a garbage compactor (sp?)
I might sound like a bleeding heart lib on this one, but jeez...

[MaggieMay]

This is indeed an offense which breaks a law. Therefore it is criminal by definition.

[SarahW]

What alternate reality do you live in? Animals are either ferrel or property, but the law acknowleges the obvious; it is not only possible to be cruel to animals, but it can be criminal to treat animals cruelly. To believe otherwise is to ignore reality. Animals have hearts, brains, nerve endings (some moreso than others). They have the capacity to suffer. As their stewards we are to treat them humanely and minimize their suffering when possible.

[steve-b]

Begone, troll. Punishing the guilty (of more than he was charged with, actually -- as I explained earlier, he ought to have been charged with terroristic threat) is not morally equivalent to punishing at random, unless you're one of those idiots who thinks that bombing the Talibastards was no different from perpetrating the 9/11 Massacre.

[steve-b]

More of Renatus' moral thought here.

[steve-b]

sending someone to prison for a year for killing some kittens is utterly useless

I daresay that a prison guard with this kind of reputation for brutality will need rather less than the full year of feeding....

[Sangamon Kid]

This is indeed an offense which breaks a law. Therefore it is criminal by definition.

You haven't followed my logic...I'll say it again, or rather make it clearer. His behavior is deviant, but only criminal if the kittens were another person's property. See the difference?

[Sangamon Kid]

Begone, troll. Punishing the guilty (of more than he was charged with, actually -- as I explained earlier, he ought to have been charged with terroristic threat) is not morally equivalent to punishing at random, unless you're one of those idiots who thinks that bombing the Talibastards was no different from perpetrating the 9/11 Massacre.

Begone, troll? What in h*ll are you talking about?

[MaggieMay]

As a lay person I can support the decision and sentencing of this prison guard. But, I also understand,that there are very strict interpretations of what constitutes criminal intent, which may be your frustration, reguarding my views on this thread. Flame away.

[tracer]

You worked at a state hospital in Texas? I thought you sounded familiar!!

Do you remember Julius Caesar? I recall that you were a very fine centurion, but not as good as Gabby Hays or Mr. Green Jeans. Oh, the word for today is "spindle." Radio.......

[little-e]

That's right....I sure would be....

[little-e]

I thought I was being rather kind...at first I was going to suggest having the guard stick his head in the compactor....

[Renatus]

My mother who is now dead loved her children deeply and taught us to love God and neighbor. She taught us our prayers and a deep love and respect for the Roman Catholic Church, which is the greatest gift she and my dad handed on to us. Anyhow, once her grandchildren were visiting her and discovered a nest of little kittens in an abandoned shed nearby. The children played with the kitten and they all got ringworm. My mother got a shovel, went over to the cats and bashed all their heads in and then buried them. Now, I suppose you will tell me that she should have gone to jail for her actions. BS!

[kaylar]

You haven't followed my logic...I'll say it again, or rather make it clearer. His behavior is deviant, but only criminal if the kittens were another person's property. See the difference?

No. If the thing had put kittens he purchased into a trash compactor alive, he would still have been guilty of breaking the law. There are laws against animal cruelty : BY LAW, if you own animals , you are required to give them adequate food, shelter, and medical care, and you are not allowed to abuse them physically. If you starve your animal, leave them outside without shelter in bad weather, let injuries or illnesses go untreated, or beat them, you can and will be punished. Punishments include confiscation of animals, fines, probation, jail time, and being forbidden by law to own animals for a certain period (Usually 5 years, but sometimes longer).

I don't know where some freepers (not you, kid ; others on this thread) get the idea that they can do "whatever they want" with their own animals, when the law clearly states animal abuse is a crime, whether they own the animal or not. If any freeper doubts me, please : Go find a stray dog, and let people see you beat it, starve it, torture it, maim it, set it on fire-whatever. When the police come for you, tell themn you own the dog, and have the right to treat it in that matter. Tell the same thing to the judge. See you in a year or so.

[Sangamon Kid]

Flame away.

I'm not sure why you think I would do so. I'm not upset with anything you've posted. Besides, the act of flaming suggests that someone has already lost the debate and resorts to a baser form of argument. I'll let others stoop to that.

You are correct in that I am frustrated with a society that devalues human life, calls "evil good, and good evil", that twists the meaninig of words to promote their agenda, and rips the innocence from our children at the earliest possible age.

[PhilDragoo]

This is a horrible thing to do to defenseless animals....a year in prison is not enough....he should have been sentenced to having his hand stuck in the same trash compactor and see what it felt like to be crushed....

A fraternity brother's dad had run a punch-press at a box plant his adult life, was up in the union, got me a summer job to help defray exorbitant college tuition.

I was operator of the slitter and baler for the scrap produced by the box plant for one shift one summer.

Defective sheets were fed into the slitter (scissor-like rotary knives on an eight-foot long, four-inch diameter steel shaft). These strips were sucked into a seven bladed steel fan run by an electric motor the size of a wood stove. These playing card-size pieces were sucked up a twelve-inch pipe to the roof collector cone fed by other pipe runs from machines throughout the plant.

A blizzard of these pieces fell down the two-foot-square chute into the space ahead of the baling ram. An electric eye would signal the ram that the chute was full; then it would hydraulically compress the pieces into an eighth of their volume. When a 1,000-lb. block was obtained, five lengths of baling wire were fed around it and tied off. When the steel door was opened the cube was driven onto steel rollers by the compressing ram's action, ready for pickup by forklift to carry to the waiting railroad car.

If the guard is not Roto-Rooteredtm by 12 months with his fan club, I could have fit him into the space in front of the ram. During peak periods it was necessary to climb up, open the door, and stomp down the scrap--when the ram was back, of course. For it would come forward automatically, and would have no compunction about crushing a leg.

Kind of like the guard.

[triplejake]

Whatever other problems society has don't excuse letting someone who does something you seem to agree is reprehensible go unpunished. And MaggieMay is right that something is criminal pretty much whenever the legislature passes laws saying it is, your property or not.