SPCA and animal abuse figures at odds

Crime statistics show Auckland’s animal abuse is dropping, but frontline staff say that’s not the case.

Police figures show animal abuse in the Auckland policing district, which covers central, eastern and western Auckland, dropped by 42.9 percent last year with only eight cases recorded.

Auckland SPCA general manager David Lloyd-Barker says the shelter has noticed just the opposite.
"We are finding increases in cases of wilful cruelty rather than acts of omission like failing to provide vet treatment. We are dealing with more cases of people deliberately hurting animals."

He says many cases are reported to the SPCA rather than the police which could account for the difference.

"When police deal with it, the cases come to us and we do the prosecutions.

"We’ve got three cases running at the moment with people strangling dogs, cooking dogs alive, throwing kittens against walls."

The offences happen all across the Auckland district, he says.

The SPCA prosecuted 45 people for animal abuse last year and Mr Lloyd-Barker says numbers have risen quickly.

"Year on year we’re up 407 percent. We’ve had a zero tolerance policy as long as I’ve been here which is about three years and we’ve noticed an increase because of that."

He says there is no reason why people are being more abusive to animals.

"I don’t understand why people drag goats behind cars to kill them, why people strangle dogs."

Overall crime in the district dropped by 5 percent, with 1312 offences recorded for every 10,000 people.

Crime dropped across all offence categories except violence, where it rose by 0.4 percent compared with a 5.2 percent rise nationally.

Police say the increase was driven by more reporting of family violence.

Burglary was also up 9 percent and fraud increased by 20 percent.

A tougher stance on those breaking liquor bans led to a 21.8 percent increase in recorded breaches, while drug and antisocial offences were down 1.4 percent.

- © Fairfax NZ News