A British man was jailed Friday for more than five years for killing nine cats between October 2018 and June 2019 in the seaside town of Brighton.
A judge at Hove Crown Court in southern England sentenced the 54-year-old man to five years and three months in jail, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said.
Some of the cats’ owners were at the sentencing. They told the court how they found their cats bleeding on their doorsteps after being attacked with a knife. The judge called the killings cruel, and “it struck at the very heart of family life”.
The man was caught on camera walking towards a cat and stabbing the animal with a knife. It’s not clear why he killed the cats, all owned by families.
None of us can comprehend what drove him to do this to family pets, said Jayne Cioffi, a senior crown prosecutor.
The judge said at trial the actual number of cats he attacked might have been more. The attacks caused widespread horror in the UK, where many people own a cat.
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