A horse dealer and his father who allowed horses, ponies and donkeys to starve to death on their Co Antrim farm, have been sentenced to nearly two years.
Judge Desmond Marrinan told 55-year-old Robert James McAleenan and his 25-year-old son, Conor, that “it is one of the worst cases of animal cruelty” he had encountered and that they should be “thoroughly ashamed of their callous behaviour”.
The Antrim Crown Court judge said he was unimpressed and found no substance in defence claims father and son had not set out to deliberately cause suffering or distress to the animals, and it was a case of neglect.
The case photographs were “horrific . . . almost unbelievable”, and they and the evidence bore “testimony to the fact they treated these poor animals in a pitiless manner without the slightest regard for their welfare”.
“In my view they are unfit to be carers for any animal. They should be thoroughly ashamed of their callous behaviour,” said Judge Marrinan.
Last month the men, also banned from keeping animals for 25 years, originally from the Oldpark area of north Belfast, pleaded guilty to a total of 32 charges of causing unnecessary suffering to the animals between November 1st and 25th in 2011 on their Lisnevenagh Road farm.
Conor McAleenan, who owned the animals, was given a sentence of 14 months. His father, who owned the farm between Antrim and Ballymena, was given nine months.
However, by law, they were told they will serve only half the term in jail followed by half under supervised licensed parole.
In his three page sentencing remarks Judge Marrinan said the sentences may have been more, but that there was an unnecessary delay, three years, in dealing with the case, and in addition, the pair were entitled to modest credit for their guilty pleas.
Sitting in Coleraine, the judge said what confronted vets and police on November 22, 2011, following a tip-off from a member of the public, was a scene of horror and overpowering stench with dead animals lying in a heap, with other standing around in filth left to fend for themselves.
One vet said that the “scale of what he saw was unbelievably large .... that father and son had fundamentally failed to protect the animals – failed to address the most basic health and husbandry requirements”, and that some of the animals were in “such a pitiful state of suffering that they had to be euthanised on humane grounds”.
Judge Marrinan said that “in short these animals had no suitable environment, proper food and no attention paid to their need to be protected from pain, suffering injury and disease”.
The animals, he said were left to fend for themselves, and “most of them were denied one or more of their basic needs on a deliberate and callous fashion. The scale and numbers involved and the suffering endured makes this one of the worst cases of its type”.
Last week prosecutor George Chisney described the horrific scene of devastation which met police and a vet when they first went to the farm between Antrim and Ballymena on November 22nd, 2011.
In one corner the vet found a heap of bodies of dead horses and ponies, which had been dead for sometime, while in a shed were found six animals in an emaciated state, with the body of a seventh lying against the wall.
Mr Chesney said those animals still alive were living in filthly conditions, with neither adequate food or water, were being subjected to unanswerable suffering.
The lawyer described one pony found lying down, unable to rise, which eventually had to be put down.
The lawyer said of the 63 horses, ponies and donkeys discovered, the corpses of six animals were found rotting, while three others had to be put down.
Initially the bulk of them, 45, were moved to a neighbouring farm, before being looked after by a number of charities and animal sanctuaries.
Defence lawyer Des Fahy for Conor McAleenan explained that after changing from looking after working and show horses, he moved into the commercial market, but soon found himself to be totally ill-equipped.
“The situation had become overwhelming and it got outside their control . . . it became a vicious circle,” said Mr Fahy, who added McAleenan should have sought help before the authorities became involved, which was inevitable.
Mr Stephen Mooney, for McAleenan snr, said while he owned the farm, the day to day running and maintains of the animals were really the responsibility of his son.
However, as the owner, he still bore some responsibility for them, and readily accepted his guilt.