Responding to charges of felony cruelty to animals, Mathews told Judge Lois Belden, "Those were my animals," apparently feeling this justified his actions. The judge disagreed.
Vicky House, a self-proclaimed rabbit "rescuer" had been collecting stray and abandoned rabbits in a barn on her property for several years. Despite numerous complaints about "deplorable living conditions" and inadequate nutritional and health care for the dozens of rabbits in her care, no legal action was taken . . . not until she had discontinued her operation, leaving some 85 to 125 rabbits to starve in their cages. Legitimate rabbit rescuers, who had long been concerned for the welfare of House's rabbits, found that Vicky House had disappeared and all of the rabbits had died before help arrived.
Neglect and what's come to be known as the "animal collection syndrome" aren't always recognized as animal cruelty. Collectors typically view themselves as "rescuers" but may be driven by hidden psychological problems. Many cases of abuse result more from ignorance or a view of animals as mere property and not living creatures with feelings and needs. And it's impossible to calculate the number of animals who have suffered needlessly in the name of science or "the good of mankind."
ESCALATING VIOLENCE
Psychologists and criminal justice organizations since at least the early 1970s have recognized a direct correlation between early animal abuse and adult violent antisocial behaviors including child, spouse, and elder abuse, murder, and rape.
Jeffrey Dahmer, before he was convicted of killing, dismembering, and cannibalizing 17 young men, got his kicks from impaling dogs and staking cats to trees in his backyard. Edmunc Kemper, convicted in 1973 of killing eight women including his mother, had already practiced on neighborhood cats, sometimes burying them alive and mounting their heads on poles as trophies. He decapitated his own cat and cut her into small pieces just as he did, years later, to his mother.
Albert Desalvo, better known as the Boston Strangler, had started out trapping dogs and cats in crates and shooting arrows through the boxes.
Luke Woodham, who killed his mother then went to school and shot several classmates, described his beating, burning, and torturing his dog, Sparkle, as an act of "true beauty." Fifteen-year-old Kip Kinkel, who killed both parents and opened fire on schoolmates in his high school cafeteria, was remembered by fellow students as someone who bragged about torturing animals and allegedly "blowing up a cow."
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