SOUTH KOREA -- A South Korean man was arrested for slaughtering 600 stray cats and selling the meat for medicinal soups.
The man, identified only by the surname Jeong, was taken into custody in May for violating South Korea's animal protection laws, reported Yonhap on Thursday.
Jeong, who is in his 50s, said he sold the meat to traditional Korean health care centers – claiming the meat could be used in soups to treat arthritis.
South Korea's Chosun TV reported Jeong employed a brutal method of butchering the cats.
After trapping the cat, he would throw the live cat into boiling water, pull out the dead cat's fur then store the gutted meat in vinyl packages – in an industrial-sized refrigerator.
When police raided his secluded farmhouse, they found a trash bin stuffed with animal intestines and organs. Inside a refrigerator were packages of unidentifiable meat.
Jeong had been dealing in cat meat since February 2014, north Busan police said.
He would make as much as $13.72 per cat meat pack, and earned a total of $8,230.14 in revenue before his arrest on May 8.
Jeong said he was destitute and performing different kinds of menial labor before he found his way into his illegal business.
Busan police said they managed to rescue 18 cats trapped inside boxes.
Due to a legal loophole, the health care centers in question will not be charged for acquiring the cat meat.
(UPI.com - May 21, 2015)
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