Sussex man who killed kitten banned from owning animals for 10 years

Michael Sweetman (DOB 11.11.96), of Allingham Place, Ovingdean, pleaded guilty to two offences involving the infliction of physical violence to two kittens at an earlier hearing.

Brighton Magistrates Court previously heard how tabby kitten Prince had been buried in a shoebox in a garden behind Sweetman’s address.

The court heard how police requested RSPCA Inspector Charlotte Beaumann to attend the scene after the family who rehomed Prince to Sweetman a month earlier had seen Sweetman bury Prince.

Family members had exhumed the shoebox containing his body and reported the matter to the police.

In her written evidence to the court the inspector said: “Inside was a deceased tabby male kitten wrapped in a towel. I could immediately see that there was a large haematoma on the kitten’s left ear and some bruising, there also appeared to be some bruising on the other ear too”.

Police seized the body of Prince and a second kitten, placing them in the RSPCA’s care so that Charlotte could take them to a nearby veterinary practice.

X-rays revealed Prince had received a number of significant, unexplained injuries. A post-mortem revealed he had a fractured pelvis and a possible rib fracture. There had also been a fracture in his tail.

When interviewed, Sweetman claimed Prince had fallen into the toilet which contributed to Prince’s eventual death. However the severity of Prince's injuries were not consistent with having fallen into a toilet nor was there any evidence that Prince had drowned at postmortem.

A postmortem on Prince’s body showed there was no underlying disease that could have rendered his bones more fragile and prone to fracture, leading to a conclusion that Prince had been repetitively injured via significant blunt force trauma.

An overarching veterinary expert for the RSPCA reviewed the evidence and concluded Prince had been repetitively injured to a degree that had caused multiple bone fractures.

The report read: “Prince died as a consequence of having sustained severe blunt force trauma injuries while in the home environment which included a depressed skull fracture. From the evidence provided such an injury cannot be reasonably explained other than by the mechanism of physical abuse’.

“The nature and characteristics of the injuries sustained by Prince are very highly suggestive of Prince having been forcefully held by the skin at the scruff and the neck and thrown to collide with a blunt object resulting in the fractured bones along the left side of the kitten’s body.

"In such circumstances, Prince would have experienced pain as a consequence of the subcutaneous tissues being torn and would have suffered fear and distress for a period of several seconds prior to sustaining the severe head injury”.

The second kitten was found to have sustained a fractured tail vertebra similar in nature to that was sustained by Prince. She recovered in RSPCA foster care and has subsequently been rehomed.

At a sentencing hearing on 11 August at Worthing Magistrates' Court, Sweetman was sentenced to five months', imprisonment, suspended for 12 months, following an RSPCA investigation and prosecution.

Magistrates ordered him to complete 150 hours of unpaid work, 20 Rehabilitation Activity Requirement days and a six month alcohol treatment requirement.

Following the sentencing hearing, Charlotte said: “It’s completely unacceptable to treat any animal in this way and we will always look into reports of animal cruelty and, where necessary, seek justice for that animal.”