Sun, Sep 12, 2021 page3

• FEATURE: Cat abuse case puts spotlight on animal rights laws

  • Staff writer, with CNA
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  After 11 days of intensive care, Tea Tea (茶茶), a tabby cat in New Taipei City, succumbed to his injuries on Aug. 28.

  He endured 13 hours of hell on Aug. 17 when his owner allegedly doused him with boiling water and beat him so hard with an umbrella that it bent.

  Tea Tea was a tool of manipulation for the suspect, surnamed Lee (黎), who had filmed the torture of the cat he had kept with his ex-girlfriend to try to force her to reconcile.

  

  A cat named Tea Tea sits in a cardboard box in an undated photograph.

  Photo courtesy of Fan Shu-hsien via CNA

  Fan Shu-hsien (范舒閑), who rushed to the rescue of Tea Tea, along with other animal lovers and local police, said she could not bear the sight when she arrived.

  Tea Tea was scalded so badly that he had lost a lot of his fur and his ears were curled, Fan said.

  The news has gone viral on social media and prompted a public outcry calling for Wang to be jailed, but experts say it is difficult to seek heavy punishment for animal abusers under the Animal Protection Act (動物保護法).

  “I have not seen any case of animal cruelty result in penalties that cannot be commuted to a fine,” said Lu Chiu-yuan (呂秋遠), a lawyer who is representing Lee’s ex-girlfriend in a lawsuit against him.

  According to the act, killing, deliberately hurting or causing injury to an animal can lead to a jail term of up to two years and a fine of NT$200,000 to NT$2 million (US$7,218 to US$72,176).

  Many consider the punishment to be light because if a court sentences an offender to a jail term of up to six months for an offense that carries a maximum of five years, the sentence can be commuted to a fine of up to NT$3,000 for each day of the sentence.

  Soon after Tea Tea’s situation was reported, a petition was launched on the Public Policy Online Participation Platform — which allows people to propose policy suggestions to the government — arguing that the act is outdated and urging stricter punishment for animal abusers.

  The petition had garnered nearly 44,000 signatures as of Friday — well above the threshold of 5,000 signatures in 60 days, meaning the agency in charge of animal protection has to respond within two months, or by Oct. 27.

  The petition is being reviewed by Cheng Chu-ching (鄭祝菁), head of the Council of Agriculture’s Animal Protection Section, the central authority responsible for such cases.

  However, the situation is more complicated than what the public thinks, Cheng said.

  From a legal perspective, three major amendments were made to the act from 2015 to 2017, imposing heavier penalties on animal abusers, mainly in the wake of a shocking series of cat killings.

  Macanese Chan Ho-yeung (陳皓揚), a former National Taiwan University student, was convicted of brutally killing two cats in Taipei in 2015 and 2016.

  The maximum jail term for animal abusers at the time was one year, with a fine of NT$100,000 to NT$1 million. It was not until 2017 that the penalty was doubled.

  Regardless, the judge did not give Chan the heaviest possible penalty.

  In the ruling in 2016, he was given two concurrent six-month sentences for the two offenses and fined NT$150,000 and NT$250,000.

  However, Chan was only required to pay NT$350,000 and serve a 10-month jail term, with the latter commutable to a fine of NT$600,000.

  “The fundamental solution lies in a legal status being granted to animals so that they are not treated merely as objects,” Environment & Animal Society of Taiwan deputy chief executive Chen Yu-min (陳玉敏) said.

  Once the law states that animals are no longer objects, judges would have a stronger basis to impose heavier sentences, Chen said.

  Besides the legal aspect, there is the issue of enforcement.

  Government data showed that there were 6,462 animal cruelty cases reported from 2018 to last year, but 161 offenders, or 2.5 percent, were punished.

  The low conviction rate was a result of improper law enforcement, namely a lack of animal protection police, animal advocates said.

  Cheng’s office said that there are three categories of people, either full-time or part-time staff, handling animal protection affairs: animal shelter staff, veterinarians stationed at shelters and animal protection inspectors.

  As of April 30, there were only 102 full-time and 72 part-time inspectors across the country, the office said, adding that their legal status is vague.

  In the case of pets, it is one thing for inspectors to be given the right to “check” on owners reported as abusers, and another thing to carry out these inspections.

  “The inspectors cannot break in during an emergency, cannot arrest people, and do not have enough knowledge or power to collect evidence,” it said.

  This shows the importance of government structure.

  Cheng said that local governments are tasked with finding animal protection inspectors, while a specialized police unit would require action by the Ministry of the Interior.

  Increased civic participation, including help from animal groups, is needed to raise awareness about animal protection and curb abuses, she said.

  Lu agreed that there are challenges faced by animal protection personnel and that they should have increased powers and more access to resources.

  “We need to take action now by pushing lawmakers to create better laws,” Lu said.
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