‘My best friend in the entire world was taken from me’
Her ex-boyfriend is accused of killing her pet dog Kelly while she was holidaying in Australia. Now, writes Bevan Hurley, Jess Mathieson wants to toughen the law herself.
A loving pet owner whose dog was allegedly beaten to death by her former partner is horrified he was offered diversion by police at his first appearance.
Waikato University law student Jess Mathieson had just arrived on the Gold Coast for a family holiday in April when she received the news that her pet pig dog Kelly had drowned in the bath.
But a subsequent autopsy revealed Kelly had severe internal injuries including a ruptured liver, severe internal bleeding and bruising to the head and leg that weren’t consistent with drowning.
Her long-term partner Mathew Harris was charged with cruelty or ill treatment of animals under the Animal Welfare Act. Harris appeared in the Te Awamutu District Court this week and was offered diversion by police, which would mean he would not be convicted for the crime.
But it was subsequently withdrawn after Mathieson and her family ‘‘kicked up enough of a fuss’’ against the move.
Mathieson, from Ohaupo, was so upset that she started a petition calling for greater consistency on animal cruelty sentencings.
She wrote: ‘‘My best friend in the entire world was taken from me. Kelly was my dog and words could never express how much I loved her. I often joked that I would never be able to have children because I would never be able to love them as much as my Kelly – I still think that.
‘‘How is it that somebody can get so angry at an innocent dog that they rupture her liver, break her leg, break her ribs and give her contusions to the head, to then get offered diversion?’’
In a statement, police said: ‘‘In this situation the diversion was retracted as there was an error with the victim consultation on Police’s behalf.’’
When contacted, Mathew Harris said the matter was being dealt with by his lawyer. ‘‘At this point I don’t really want to comment,’’ he said. ‘‘The bath thing still happened.’’
He will reappear at the Te Awamutu District Court on September 6.
The case has so incensed Mathieson, who is in her fourth year studying law at Waikato University, that she is now going to seek to do her honours papers on the state of animal law and how it should be seen as a more serious matter.
A spokeswoman for the SPCA said they supported a consistent approach to sentencing in animal cruelty cases, but it depended on a number of factors such as previous convictions.
On the same day Mathieson’s ex-partner was offered diversion, Kaikohe man Hanuere Paul Witehira was jailed for two years and five months for bashing his son’s puppy eight times on the head with a hammer.
Writing in the July edition of Law Talk, Palmerston North animal welfare prosecutor Nicky Wynne said sentencing judges in two recent animal cruelty cases had accepted a link between violence towards pets and domestic violence incidents.
She said previous convictions for violent acts committed against humans were now being
I often joked that I would never be able to have children because I would never be able to love them as much as my Kelly – I still think that.’ JESS MATHIESON
taken into account as aggravating features in cases of animal abuse. ‘‘There is a need for greater understanding of the triggers leading to animal abuse and offending, which may lead to greater prospects for rehabilitation, rather than purely punitive outcomes. The overall well-being of our animals may be at a higher standard once we gain that understanding.’’
Under the Animal Welfare Act, a person who wilfully ill- treats animals causing serious injury or death can be sentenced to five years and fined up to $100,000.
In 2015, Michael Whitelock was sentenced to four and a half years jail for animal cruelty offences in what was believed to be the longest sentence for animal cruelty.
More than a hundred cows had their tails broken, and others were shot in the kneecaps on a West Coast farm managed by Whitelock.