SPCA calls for criminal charges in sled dog killings
By Medha, Vancouver Sun September 15, 2011 11:05 PM
The B.C. SPCA has recommended criminal charges in the Whistler sled dog massacre.
If approved by Crown, the charges would relate to Bob Fawcett, who said in a WorkSafeBC claim that he had shot or slit the throats of about 100 dogs in a post-Olympic cull.
“We have submitted our report to the Crown and recommend criminal charges against Bob Fawcett for causing unnecessary pain and suffering to animals,” said B.C. SPCA animal cruelty investigator Marcie Moriarty.
Moriarty said she is hopeful the Crown will accept the recommendations, but that a decision may be months away because the SPCA report is “a few thousand pages long; it will take them [the Crown] a while to go through it.”
News of the cull first surfaced this January with documents leaked to the media showing that Fawcett, a dog sled tour operator with Whistler company Outdoor Adventures, had been compensated by WorkSafeBC for trauma arising from complying with an order to do a mass cull of sled dogs when demand for tours dropped after the 2010 Winter Olympics.
In the report, he detailed how he had shot or slit the throats of about 100 dogs over a two-day period.
The report triggered public outrage. The B.C. government responded by appointing a task force to review the dogsled industry and passing what it said was some of the toughest regulations against animal cruelty in Canada.
Moriarty said the investigation was complex and challenging not only because of the number of animals involved, but also because the SPCA had to exhume the bodies of more than fifty dogs from a mass burial site in Whistler.
If convicted, Fawcett faces imprisonment of not more than five years or a fine not exceeding $10,000 or both.作者: Lik 時間: 2011-9-15 23:35
While I agree that Bob Fawcett deserves to get charged, I can't believe how the mother company (Whistler Outdoor Adventures) can avoid any legal responsibilities in the matter. IIRC, Fawcett was more of the executioner (in every sense of the word), while the big boss at WOA was at least partly responsible for handing out the death sentence to the sled dogs.
