Elderly guide dog volunteer fined $20,000 for torturing kitten to death

A Perth Magistrate has labelled a 71-year-old man a "disgrace to the human race" and fined him $20,000 after hearing graphic details of how the elderly charity worker tortured a kitten with his two dogs because he suspected it was killing native birds. John William Connell pleaded guilty today to what the RSPCA say is one of the worst cases of animal cruelty they have ever seen.



On February 1 this year Connell of Beckenham, Australia, was spotted by a neighbour kicking a cat around a park. When the cat tried to escape he set his two dogs on the animal, the dogs attacked it before Connell told them to stop, took the cat and threw it several metres away with the dogs chasing after it. He continued to use the cat to play with his dogs before eventually taking the body of the animal and throwing it into a creek.

In sentencing Magistrate Michael Wheeler said the incident was a "sustained act of vile cruelty. You tortured this cat and treated it like a cockroach," he said. Mr Wheeler heard Connell has worked as a guide dog trainer for 20 years and does charity work at Graylands Hospital and the Seventh Day Adventist Aged Care home in Rossmoyne where he takes his dogs to interact with residents as part of animal therapy.

Contains animal cruelty.


For this reason Mr Wheeler rejected the RSPCA’s application to have Connell banned from being in charge of an animal for five years, but said a serious fine needed to be imposed and rejected Connell’s application for a spent conviction order as the offence was "too serious."
Connell attempted to address the Magistrate at one point during the proceedings, telling him he was worried about feral cats killing native birds. Mr Wheeler advised him to sit down and let his lawyer speak for him. Connell was also ordered to pay $2121.95 in costs.