Under the terms of the resolution, the 16-year-old male teen admitted to facts in the case in exchange for having the third-degree felony charge against him for the killing and torture of a companion animal amended to a class A misdemeanor for aggravated animal cruelty, removing the “companion” and “torture” elements of the charge.
- 30 says suspended detention. The future serial killer doesn't have to serve even one day as long as he follows all of the court orders and does not break any laws complete 35 hours of community service, specifically to an animal shelter
- complete a mental health evaluation and follow the recommendations of that evaluation
- provide a DNA sample that will be kept on file in a database along with his photograph and fingerprints, and have his parents pay the associated $150 fee for the test
Washington County Prosecuting Attorney Angela Adams said she didn’t feel the prosecution could prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the teen’s intent was to kill and torture the kitten.
“The best intent that we would be able to prove,” Adams said, “was that he tried to scare it away, get it out of its yard, screw around with it, whatever, and it ended up dying.”
Washington County, the shame of Utah
“I acted recklessly and caused the death of a cat,” the teen told the court Wednesday.
The teen acknowledged that he intended to shoot the cat with the blow dart and scare the cat away, but said he didn’t intend for the cat to die.
“I hope this process has been a good lesson for you,” Leavitt said to the teen during the court proceedings. “Sometimes it’s hard, particularly if you’re used to hunting or even just dealing with animals in a certain way, it’s hard to get an idea as to why this stuff becomes a big deal. I hope through this process you’ve understood that – why the law is what it is in respecting animals and that it can be a serious thing.”
The courtroom benches were filled with approximately 15 animal rights activists.
When the disposition had ended, animal rescue worker Kris Neal said she was satisfied with the results.
“I guess the outcome is as good as it can be,” Neal said. “Of course, we always want more punishment, but we’ve got a lot of awareness out of this.”
Neal said she would like to see the laws changed to require stricter punishments in incidents involving animal cruelty.
“To me, it’s just so sad that our laws are so weak that somebody actually has to torture an animal to get a punishment that’s deserving of the crime,” Neal said, “where if they simply kill them, we get a slap on the hands. So, in that respect, it really saddens me that our laws are like that.”
Dennis Rader tortured and killed animals
before going on to torture and murder humans
Earlier:
