Fourteen-Year-Old Mini Is Ripped to Shreds by a Pack of Vicious Hounds but Those Responsible Never Will Be Punished Because the Limeys Value the "Unspeakable in Full Support of the Uneatable" Far More Than They Do Her Right to Live

Beautiful Mini in Happier Days

"People say accidents happen, but this was no accident. This was an evil act. "

               -- Carly Jose

Imagine living in a country so backward that packs of vicious dogs are routinely allowed to break down fences, tear up vegetable patches, frighten livestock and, worst of all, kill cats with impunity. Secondly, imagine a country where the police are so notoriously lawless and corrupt that they not only categorically refuse to arrest the dogs' owners but actually join in with them in the commission of their unconscionable crimes.

Thirdly, picture in one's mind a country where prosecutors refuse to prosecute the obviously guilty and jurists steadfastly decline to punish those handful of miscreants who actually are arrested. Finally, imagine a country whose supreme leader not only praises the lawbreakers to high heaven but eggs them on in the same breath.

If per chance the United "Bullshit" States of America should have come readily to mind, that would have been a good guess but wrong. Whereas there can be little denying that most Americans are a vile and violent assortment of flotsam and jetsam without any redeeming characteristics, lest an unwillingness to ever tell the truth about a single, solitary thing is now considered to be a virtue, they have not gone quite that far off the rails -- at least not yet. Rather, it is their blue-blooded cousins from across the pond in Angleterre who can, arguably, lay claim to the prestigious title of being the most lawless and backward people on the planet.

For instance, back on Saturday, March 6th a beautiful fourteen-year-old tortoiseshell named Mini was minding her own business in her front garden on a quiet street in Madron, a small rural village of roughly sixteen-hundred inhabitants located on the Penwith Peninsula, three kilometers northwest of Penzance in western Cornwall, when she was savagely attacked and killed by a pack of six or more foxhounds belonging to the Western Hunt. In a video shot by a neighbor from across the street on his mobile telephone, a skinny huntsman with a long black beard and scruffily-dressed in knee-high boots, a maroon sweatshirt, dark pants, a black cap, and carrying what appears to be a whip can be seen belatedly arriving on the scene and yelling at the dogs to "leave it."

After making sure that the coast was clear, the criminal then picked up Mini's body and flung it with all his might over a fence and into another neighbor's garden. "The man can be seen (on film) checking himself and then throwing her as far as he can into the hedge," Mini's thirty-nine-year-old heartbroken owner, Carly Jose, who works as a teaching assistant, related to the Daily Mail of London on March 8th. (See "Hounds Maul Pet Cat to Death Before Hunt Worker 'Throws the Body into a Hedge' in Shocking Footage.") "He just wanted to cover his tracks, I think."

The still as of yet unidentified huntsman's total lack of any respect whatsoever for Mini was, perhaps, even more galling than the behavior of his hounds. "Mini was evidence to the huntsman. That's all," Jose later told Keep the Ban in a tearful May 28th video. (See "Carly Jose Talks Through the Moments Her Rescue Cat Was Killed by the Western Hunt.") "It's not the hounds' fault at all. I've never blamed the hounds. They (the foxhunters) breed the hounds unnecessarily; they're making them do this."

The culprit then hightailed it out of there and can be seen laying down tracks at a furious pace up a grassy alleyway between residences. In spite of his fancy stepping he was unable to escape from Jose's neighbor who shadowed him every step of the way.

Once the cameraman had finally run him to ground, he is believed to have told him that he "would be back." Whether he did in fact return to the scene of his diabolical crime has not been disclosed in press reports. Even more importantly, the slack media have not even bothered to broach the subject of who it was that finally corralled the dogs and brought them under control.

Every bit as pertinent, no riders on horseback are anywhere to be seen and few, if any, men are capable of keeping up on foot with a pack of hounds. That is especially the case if they were after either a fox or following a so-called artificially-laid trail.

That is a point of contention that troubles Jose to this very day. "I wonder what the hounds had been doing here," she mused to Cornwall Live of Plymouth on March 6th. (See "Cat Killed by Pack of Hounds and Then Thrown over Fence by Huntsman.")  "Could they smell Mini? Did they come this way just to get her?"

The Unsupervised Dogs Swoop in for the Kill

The Western Hunt has subsequently claimed that the hounds were not chasing a fox on that particular occasion but rather that they were simply being exercised. Regardless of where the truth lies, there cannot be any denying that they were out of control.

Furthermore, whereas it is always possible that they could have picked up Mini's scent from afar, it is equally possible that they smelled one or more of the unidentified animals that Jose has admitted to keeping in cages in her rear garden. Mini therefore could have been an unintended victim of the hounds.

By even posing those questions Jose fully realizes that she might as well be asking for the moon. "I suppose we will never know because they (the Western Hunt) will never tell us," she concluded to Cornwall Live. "But things like this shouldn't be happening. I shouldn't have to fear for the lives of my animals in my own street. No one should."

Nevertheless, that is the precarious position that cats and their owners residing in England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland have been placed in all because foxhunters are a law unto themselves.

Quite understandably, the killing of Mini has taken a terrible toll on Jose and that is so much the case that she is unlikely to ever fully recover from it during her lifetime. "We're (she and her three children) trying to wrap our heads around what has happened today and why," she continued to Cornwall Live. "It's really hard. We're all absolutely devastated." 

Adopted from a shelter in November of 2016 following the death of Jose's father, Mini had already had a hard life. Worst still, because of her advanced years and the public's idiotic unwillingness to take in elderly cats, time was fast running out on her.

Notwithstanding all of that, it was love at first sight when she and Jose finally met. "We were told that she could get quite nasty but, when we saw her she took to us straightaway and we just said 'we want her'," Jose informed Cornwall Live.

Even so, Mini still had her trepidations. "She was scared when she came home. She had been abused and she thought we might do the same but she grew to trust us and she was so affectionate," Jose elaborated to  Keep the Ban. "She used to bite my hair at night and sleep on my pillow, and she was like my little shadow. She was my best friend."

Compounding an already simply horrific crime, Mini recently had been ill and she accordingly was hardly in any condition to defend herself, especially against a bloodthirsty pack of vicious hounds. "She really was a gorgeous little thing. She had been through a lot already in her life and had fallen very poorly with meningitis a while back and she'd almost died," Jose explained to Cornwall Live. "She still struggled to walk, so she preferred it out in the back garden."

On top of all of that, Jose's broken heart is additionally tortured by self-recriminations. "Mini was pestering me for food," she informed Cornwall Live. "She didn't like going out really, especially not out in our front garden. But today I had no choice but to let her out...I let her out the front and I still feel guilty."

Later, the Huntsman Gathers Up Mini...

Regrettably, cats of today are subject to a thousand and one mortal dangers. Even more alarmingly, it only takes a split-second for any one of the species' myriad of enemies to strike and with deadly efficiency at that.

"I keep asking myself 'what if' but these sorts of things shouldn't happen in a quiet street like ours," Jose added to Cornwall Live. "We're just a quiet little road; we're supposed to feel safe here."

Although nobody is any longer justified in feeling completely safe anywhere, anyone who ever has loved or been loved by a cat can readily identify with what Jose is feeling. For instance, there is always the regret of failing to have spent more time with a beloved cat that has departed.

Secondly, there is the regret of failing to have noticed sooner, as opposed to later, that a cat was ill. Thirdly, there is always the troubling issue of whether or not to allow a cat to go outside.

Sadly, the only teacher in that regard is the School of Hard Knocks but the tuition is not for the faint of heart. Over time conscientious individuals eventually learn how to become better guardians but even then keeping cats both healthy and safe is still a tall order and, unlike in golf, mulligans are seldom handed out.

At some unspecified time following the commission of this dastardly deed, an unidentified representative of the Western Hunt paid a call upon Jose and offered not only to bury Mini but to pay an unspecified amount in damages. Jose, however, wisely turned down both offers.

"I told him he wasn't going anywhere near my cat," she disclosed to the Daily Mail. "It's not about the money. No amount of money will bring my Mini back."

She did make one request of him but even that fell upon deaf ears. "When I asked the huntsman on my doorstep what reassurances he could give me that this wouldn't happen again, he couldn't say anything," she elaborated to Cornwall Live.

Although she has been stiffed at every step of the way so far, she is not ready to give up the fight. "I want justice for Mini. There needs to be a turning point," she declared to Cornwall Live. "Things like this cannot happen. I don't want another family to go through what we've gone through."

Whether or not she is successful in that quest remains to be determined, but her eyes have been opened and she is not about to be soft-soaped any longer by anyone. "People say, accidents happen, but this was no accident," she proclaimed to Cornwall Live. "This was an evil act."

... and Flings Her over a Neighbor's Fence

The Devon and Cornwall Police, headquartered in the Middlemoor section of Exeter in Devon, arrived on the scene twenty minutes after the attack, strutted around, took a few notes, and then dropped the matter like a hot potato. "No arrests have been made but inquiries are ongoing," is how that a spokesman for department blew it out both ends for the benefit of Cornwall Live.

With almost thirty-six-hundred officers in uniform, it is indisputable that the department has at its disposal more than enough manpower in order to have held the Western Hunt accountable. Like police forces all over the world, however, it does not have the least bit of interest in safeguarding the lives of cats and their owners. (See Cat Defender post of June 4, 2021 entitled "A Beautiful Yellow and White Cat Is Brutally Slain and Then Put on Display in the Parking Lot of a Funeral Home in Johnson City but Absolutely Nobody Cares about Apprehending Its Killer, Least of All the Utterly Worthless Local Police.")

The RSPCA likewise has turned in its customary underwhelming exposé of crocodile tears and gratuitous advice. After conceding that the video of Mini's killing was "heartbreaking to see," it promptly washed its hands of the entire matter by urging any witnesses to contact -- believe it or not? -- the thoroughly worthless slackers at the Devon and Cornwall Police.

Not about to be outdone in this or any other whopper telling contest, the Western Hunt wasted little time in demonstrating that its forked tongue can be every bit as lethal to the unvarnished truth as its hounds are to cats. "The hunt is aware of events that took place on Saturday, 6th March while the hounds were being exercised in an area where they are taken routinely, without incident, by officials of the hunt," is how that it began its defense to Cornwall Live on March 7th. (See "Western Hunt Issues Statement after Cat Mauled to Death by Hounds.") "The hunt has been in contact with the cat owner to apologize unreservedly for the distress this has caused and is also helping the police with their inquiries."

That was merely the opening salvo but once the hunt got the wind up it really shelled down the corn. "Incidents of this nature involving hounds are incredibly rare due to the professionalism with which the hounds are managed; however, the hunt has taken the matter seriously and is reviewing their (sic) procedures to prevent any reoccurrence."

Anecdotal evidence readily available online, however, tells any entirely different story. For instance, a pack of out-of-control hounds belonging to the East Sussex and Romney Marsh (ESRM) Hunt broke into a cat sanctuary operated by the Celia Hammond Animal Trust in Hastings, Sussex, on January 8, 2018 and drove off at least sixty of the facility's one-hundred-thirty resident felines.

Most of the frightened cats later were found cowering in the nearby woods but at least twenty-one of them were still missing and unaccounted for the next morning. "If anything has happened to any of my animals, there will be hell to pay," Hammond afterwards vowed to The Independent of London on January 30, 2018. (See "Hunting Hounds Tear Through Cat Sanctuary, Leaving Dozens of Rescue Animals 'Traumatized' and Missing.") "It's absolutely outrageous. I'm so angry, I'm so upset."

 If she were expecting the Sussex Police to have lent her anything remotely resembling a sympathetic ear she was quickly disabused of that notion. "The huntmaster apologized to the property owner, and there has been no report or any injury or damage or of any criminal offense being committed," is how that the force so conveniently absolved the hunt of any criminal liability to The Independent.

In sentiments that were destined to later mimic those later expressed by Jose, Hammond was left to lick her own wounds. "We bring these cats down to what's supposed to be a sanctuary, where they're supposed to be safe," she explained to The Independent. "If they've got health problems or they're old and a bit doddery, we keep them here safely. For this to happen in the place they're supposed to be safe -- we just feel violated."

Despite having been supposedly banned in England, Wales, and Scotland ever since 2005, illegal foxhunting continues to flourish. Hunters nowadays get around the ban by falsely claiming to be following  artificial trails but these trails, both real and imagined ones, are laid down in areas where foxes are known to inhabit.

He Next Hightailed It Up a Back Alley
 

In addition to that, the bans themselves contain enough loopholes in order to accommodate a Mack truck. For instance, one of them allows for foxes to be hunted if they are judged to pose a threat to game, crops, and fisheries. Another one allows for them to be hunted in order to train birds of prey.

In fact, hunters sometimes take along with them birds that they never release just to legitimize their illegal foxhunting.  (See The Conversation of Boston, January 30, 2019, "No Wonder Fox Hunting Is Still Prevalent -- the Ban Is Designed to Fail British Wildlife.")

Consequently, the cruel sport that Oscar Wilde so correctly labeled as "the unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable" in his 1893 play, "A Woman of No Importance," is every bit as much alive today as ever. Furthermore, everyone living in England, Wales, and Scotland knows only too well that the bans are a joke.

For example on November 9, 2019, Kent Hunt Sabs (KHS) employed a drone in order to film a pack of hounds and terriers belonging to the ESRM Hunt ripping apart a defenseless fox in a field near the Little Cheyne Court Wind Farm in Dungeness between Romney Marsh and Rye in East Sussex. Owing to their diminutive size, terriers are used in order to go after foxes in their dens that the larger hounds are unable to reach.

"They tore it to shreds beheading it in a process that lasted three minutes from start to finish. Neither the huntsmen or (sic) the terrier men made any attempt to intervene," Harry Blackhurst of KHS testified to Kent Live on November 13, 2019. (See "East Sussex and Romney Marsh Hunt Hit Back at Claims of 'Illegal Fox Hunting' after Footage Appears to Show Hounds Kill Fox.") "We finished the day, heartbroken that we couldn't save the fox."

In its defense, the ESRM Hunt comically maintained that the fox already was dead and that its hounds and terriers had merely stumbled upon it by accident. Adam Grogan, a wildlife expert with the RSPCA, was not amused.

"This new 'sport' was adopted by hunts after the Hunting Act of 2004 (in England and Wales) was passed. But despite the ban on traditional hunts, continuing to train hounds to follow such scents can lead to wild quarry animals such as foxes, deer and hares and other wild animals, being disturbed, chased and killed if the hounds pick up the scent of a live animal on the trail," he explained to Kent Live. "The RSPCA is opposed to any so-called 'sport' which causes suffering to animals. We believe that the use of the scent of dead animals is totally unnecessary as there are other alternatives, such as drag hunting in which hounds follow an artificially laid scent not derived from animals, which does not pose a threat to wildlife." 

As per usual, the RSPCA is not only talking nonsense but being totally dishonest in the process. First of all, hounds and terriers are trained to kill and once that instinct is combined with their highly-developed sense of smell no animal or person is completely safe when they are turned loose.

Secondly, as a fan of wildlife Grogan most assuredly knows that hounds, terriers, and other breeds of dogs routinely attack and kill cats and other small animals. Consequently, by defending any policy that allows killer canines to run loose what he is actually agitating for is the wholesale slaughter of cats like Mini.

For example, in December of last year, ten hounds belonging to the Braes of Derwent Hunt in Whittonstall, eight kilometers northwest of Consett in County Durham, broke into the Tendercare Boarding Kennels and Cattery in Stanley, six kilometers north of Burnhope in County Durham. As was the case with those that killed Mini, they were on their own without a huntsman anywhere in sight.

Mini and Carly Jose Were Especially Close

"It was horrible," Tracey Hobbs, the owner of the facility, later told The Independent on October 10th. (See "Hunt Hounds 'Invade Kennels and Cattery, Killing Owner's Pet'.") "Suddenly we saw the hounds coming hurtling down the hill toward us."

She was able to save her dogs and her chickens survived thanks to having been caged at the time.  Winter, apparently, was not nearly so fortunate.

"I heard my cat scream," she continued to The Independent. "I don't think Winter would have stood a chance against a pack of at least ten hounds."

The Independent does not say one way or the other if they actually killed Winter. All that is known for certain is that the cat was missing and nowhere to be found in the aftermath of the invasion.

Although considering the myriad of crimes that they commit against cats, wildlife, and farm animals, foxhounds are richly deserving of their just desserts. Nevertheless, it is often forgotten that allowing dogs to run loose can be extremely hazardous to their well-being.

"The hounds ran down to the gate and started jumping over a stone wall onto the main road," Hobbs informed The Independent. "They could have been killed."

The rotters at the Durham Police were notified but they quickly took a powder by telling Hobbs that the invasion was a civil as opposed to a criminal matter. When a representative of the Braes and Derwent Hunt belatedly arrived on the scene his excuse was that the dogs "must have gone off their trail."

In December of last year, hounds belonging to the High Peak Hunt of Bakewell in Derbyshire broke into Rebecca Bingham's garden and attacked her black-colored cat, Spider, while she was sitting on top of a wall. Like Mini, she never had a prayer in Hell of surviving.

"Before she had a chance to move, one jumped up on the wall," Bingham revealed to The Independent on December 30th. (See "Hunt Apologizes after 'Out of Control' Hounds Kill Pet Cat in Garden.") "She then dodged and hid underneath a car, but it crawled under after her, brought her out, jaws clamped around her stomach, and shook her like a rag doll."

Furthermore, that was far from having been the first time that hounds from the High Peak Hunt had attempted to get at Spider and her food. "We have had to remove them from the property more than once because of this," Bingham averred to The Independent. 

Celia Hammond with Two of Her Cats at Her Sanctuary in Sussex

The hunt's response to the criminal behavior of its huntsmen and hounds was disgustingly familiar. "The hunt has been in contact with the cat owner and apologized unreservedly for the distress this has caused," a representative of it told The Independent. "Incidents of this nature involving hounds are incredibly rare due to the professionalism with which the hounds are handled in kennels and throughout their lives, however, the hunt has taken this matter very seriously and is reviewing their (sic) procedures to prevent any reoccurrence."

Except for a word or two added here and there that is verbatim the same statement that the Western Hunt issued back in March after its hound had killed Mini. Plus, it is likely that all one-hundred-seventy-nine foxhunting clubs in England, the fifty-six that exist in Wales, and the ten that Scotland hosts issue the identical prepared statement every time that their hounds kill cats and other animals. It is even likely that the unspecified number of packs that exist in Northern Ireland along with the forty-one that are active in the Republic of Ireland do likewise.

Clearly, foxhunters could care less about how many cats that their dogs kill, how many individuals that they frighten out of their wits, and how much damage that they inflict upon private property. Secondly, incidents of this nature are anything but rare.

Thirdly, the hunters are, quite obviously, anything but professionals. Not only do they turn loose their dogs to rampage through neighborhoods but they steadfastly refuse to mend their evil and lawless ways. Fourthly, they are such outrageous liars that nobody except a fool would ever believe any of their public pronouncements.

In addition to the loopholes in the law, there  are several more fundamental reasons as to why foxhunters are allowed to get away scot-free with their wholesale crimes against cats and private citizens. First of all, they enjoy the support of such political bigwigs as Tony Blair, David Cameron, Theresa May, and transplanted native New Yorker "Porous" Boris Johnson. (See The Independent, July 18, 2020, "Boris Johnson Said He 'Loved' Fox Hunting in a 'Semi-Sexual' Way and Encouraged Illegal Hunts to Ignore the Ban.") 

Secondly, they are able to flourish thanks to the protection and succor that they routinely receive from the corrupt-as-hell and equally lawless police. That is not merely a popular prejudice but it is backed up by not only anecdotal but empirical evidence to boot.

For example, in a report entitled "Counting the Crimes," Action Against Foxhunting (AFF) studied police responses to eighty-one reports of illegal foxhunting during the 2019-2020 winter hunting season. The group's sample size undoubtedly would have been  much larger if a large section of the public had not long ago come to the conclusion that reporting such illegal conduct was a total waste of time and effort. 

Even those conscientious citizens who did report those eighty-one violations of law turned out to have been wasting their precious time because the police not only declined to make a single, solitary arrest but they did not even bother to return the complainants' telephone calls. "The systematic failure in dealing with hunting crimes since the Hunting Act (of 2004 which went into effect in 2005) came into force has been deliberate," retired peeler Richard Barradale Smith wrote in the introduction to the AFF's report. "The legislation introduced was designed to make the act virtually unenforceable, and successive chief constables (and) senior officers across the country have chosen to turn a blind eye to it ever since."

Based upon that, Smith then went on to draw the inescapable conclusion. "The claims of any force that they (sic)  take animal cruelty seriously have to be questioned and when illegal hunting takes place under their noses and with their knowledge, every week," he concluded. (The report in its entirety can be found on AFF's web site and it summarized in The Independent, September 21, 2020, "Police Chiefs Routinely Turn Blind Eye to Illegal Fox Hunting as Hunts Go Unchecked, Report Claims.")

The police's abdication of their duty to enforce the hunting bans has led to the formation of groups dedicated to monitoring and even disrupting these illegal hunts. Quite often these confrontations have turned violent.

Hounds from the ESRM Hunt Killing and Beheading a Fox

In a particularly ugly confrontation that occurred in the Pevensey Marshes near Herstmonceux in East Sussex on November 18, 2017, a female rider with the ESRM Hunt can be seen in a video ramming her horse into a protester with the Brighton Hunt Saboteurs (BHS). She then followed that up by striking him in the face no less than seventeen times with her riding crop.

"Get off the fucking horse!" a steward with the hunt yelled at the protester the Daily Mail reported on November 20th. (See "Huntswoman 'Repeatedly Whips a Balaclava-Clad Saboteur with a Riding Crop as He Hangs Off the Neck of her Horse' in an Ugly Clash Caught on Camera.") "Don't grab fucking horses!"

BHS was not in any mood, however, to take orders from such god-rotten, lawless filth. "Don't charge horses into people," is how that one of its representatives returned the fire. "You cannot ride people down."

The victim suffered bruises to his face and sustained a bump on his head but he did not require hospitalization. The Sussex Police eventually put in an appearance, vowed to conduct a full investigation and, predictably, never were heard from again in reference to this particular incident. (See The Independent, November 20, 2017, "Huntswoman Repeatedly Whips Protester with Riding Crop after He Grabs Her Horse on Camera.")

Whereas the peelers' refusal to enforce the hunting bans is bad enough in its own right, what is even worse is the petit fait that some of them, along with certain wildlife officials as well, actually participate in these illegal hunts themselves. With that being the reality, it is anything but surprising that they are so willing to stand both law and justice on their heads by also treating hunt monitors and saboteurs as criminals. C-est-à-dire, if Jack the Ripper were still prowling the mean streets of Victorian London the bobbies likely would be on his side rather than that of his victims.

For example, AFF found that when a pack of twenty hounds broke into a small farm in Newdigate on October 16, 2019 scattering sheep, goats, and pigs, trampling a vegetable patch, and tearing down fences, the Surrey Police took more than an hour to respond.

Once on the scene, the derelicts not only refused to survey the damage but also to make any arrests. The farm's owner was thus forced into concluding that they were "not interested."

The report also found that at a December 26, 2019 anti-hunting protest in Blandford Forum, Dorset, an unidentified cop not only refused to arrest a hunter who had shoved an elderly female demonstrator into a gutter but that he actually shook his hand. The report does not say, but the copper also likely extended his congratulations to the brute on a job well done.

Furthermore, the report found that a Staffordshire police officer sporting a lanyard from the British Association for Shooting and Conservation chased off a carload of protesters from outside of a pub where hunters had congregated. It therefore is not surprising that an AFF survey found that seventy-nine per cent  of hunters were pleased with how that they are being treated by the police as compared to eighty-six per cent of hunt opponents who were anything but happy with the short shrift that they are routinely given by the cops.

In regard to the Western Hunt and its claims of being so professional, the AFF found that between September 19, 2019 and March 7, 2020 that it had engaged in illegal foxhunting on no fewer than five separate occasions. Plus, during that same period of time it also had engaged in acts of violence against its opponents on at least two occasions and that once its hounds had invaded the grounds of a private residence in Lamorna,  nine kilometers south of Jose's home in Madron.

In an ironic twist of fate, foxes have become rather convenient scapegoats for cops. First of all, they are able to get away with illegally hunting the animals themselves. By doing so they also are able to curry favor with the various hunts while simultaneously going after animal rights proponents at the same time.

Spider of Bakewell Was Killed by Hounds from the High Peak Hunt  

Secondly, by blaming foxes for the unexplained disappearance of hundreds of cats in London, Scotland Yard has been able to get away with refusing to go after their real killer. (See The Mirror of London, articles dated September 20, 2018 and May 21, 2021 entitled, respectively, "Croydon Cat Killer Does Not Exist Say Police as They Close Investigation after Five-Hundred Deaths" and "Pet Owners Think 'Croydon Cat Killer' Is Back after Another Feline Slain and Mutilated.")

Whereas it is well understood that cops all over the world have little or no regard for cats, their owners, and various other supporters, that which is considerably less publicized is their indifference toward the elderly and infirm. For instance, the Consett Police let the Braes of Dervent Hunt off awfully easy after their hounds invaded the grounds of the Willow Burn Hospice near Lanchester on January 2, 2017.

"We have spoken to the manager of the hospice today and a Braes of Derwent representative has attended the hospice and apologized," Inspector Keith Wardle of the Consett Police mouthed to The Northern Echo of Darlington on January 4, 2017. (See "Braes of Derwent Hunt Apologizes to Willow Burn Hospice after Patients Were Left Distressed by Hounds Chasing Through Grounds.") 'We are planning to speak to the hunt to offer some word of advice for next year."

It is difficult to imagine a copper being anywhere quite as charitable if an individual were caught either trespassing or, worst still, breaking into a private residence or commercial establishment. Au contraire, that person would be promptly arrested by the scum-of-the-earth cops, carted off to the clink, and left there to rot until he was able to make bail.

In the land of the dollar bill, foxhunting flies underneath the radar screen and very little is ever heard about the cruel sport. Nevertheless, there are are at least twenty-thousand hunters scattered amongst one-hundred-fifty-two registered packs in states such as Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania; an undetermined number of outlaw and farmer hunts also exist.

It is believed that most foxhunting in the United States is conducted on private and public lands as opposed to residential neighborhoods as is the custom in England. That also would account for the lack of controversy that these hunts generate.

Although the killing of foxes is supposedly outlawed, that is more than likely a myth. Besides, wherever the animals are in short supply, such as down south, hunters simply chase and kill bobcats instead. Out west, it is coyotes that they substitute for foxes.

That is one thing that can be said for Americans: they are not particular. What they crave is blood and they are not the least bit particular about which animals and people that they kill.

Given that the USDA's Wildlife Services eradicates at least seventy-five-thousand coyotes annually at the behest of capitalists and others and that Utahans alone trap and kill tens of thousands of them for both their valuable pelts and the bounties that the state's greedy politicians place on their heads, Americans clearly do not care how miserably that they are treated. (See Cat Defender post of July 19, 2020 entitled "Beautiful Bobby Is Maimed for Life by a Leghold Trap That Not Only Was Intended for a Coyote but Also Illegally Set Within the City Limits of St. George.")   

This barbaric practice always has had its enthusiasts, such as George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, Ronald Reagan, and Jackie Kennedy, and it accordingly likely will survive despite the best efforts to the contrary of its critics. (See The Washington Post, February 22, 2018, "Twenty-First Century Fox. Will a New Generation of Fox Hunters Save Their Controversial Sport?" and the Daily Mail, March 30, 2015, "The Hunt That Still Thrills: One-Hundred-Sixty Fox Hunting Clubs Still Exist in the United States and Canada -- Although Many Have to Chase Coyotes Rather Than Red Foxes.")

An ESRM Huntswoman Lays the Whip to a Protester 

Even the feline fraternity has not proven to be completely immune to the plague in that it has a rotter in its very own woodpile by the name of Rita Mae Brown, the authoress of the highly-successful Mrs. Murphy mystery series. She is less known, perhaps, as being a Master (or should it be Mistress?) of Foxhounds with the Oak Ridge Fox Hunt in Afton, Virginia. In addition to her thoroughly enchanting cat novels, she has written at least twelve others about foxhunting.

Of course, she has always had a loose screw or two. For instance, in her early novels she is all the time complaining about having to pay income taxes and of not having enough money in order to even buy her own clothes. Given that she publishes around two novels a year and that in all likelihood she is paid somewhere in the neighborhood of US$10 million for each effort, she surely must have a terribly expensive wardrobe.

On the other hand, she could be in the same boat as Dolly Parton who once complained that people sure would be surprised to learn how much that it costs for her to look so cheap. The major difference between her and Brown being that the latter's gaudy foxhunting getup does not make her look cheap but rather a brute and an outrageous hypocrite. Furthermore, given that she is pushing eighty, she is living proof that there is no fool quite like an old one.

Returning the English, they always have had a rather perverse relationship with dogs throughout their checkered history. In particular, they love dogfighting as Michael Crichton detailed in his 1975 historical novel, The Great Train Robbery.

Even more revolting, to this very day the English, Scots, and Irish have an abhorrent habit of feeding kittens to dogs and of using killer canines in order to hunt and kill cats. (See the BBC, October 2, 2019, "Dog Fighting: Man Bought Cats on Gumtree as Live Bait," the Daily Record of Glasgow, November 8, 2019, "Twisted Thug Caught on Video Ordering His Dog to Kill a Cat Is Hunted by Police," and Your Cat of Bourne in Lincolnshire, January 21, 2021, "Cat Rescued from Previous Life as a Bait Cat Enjoys His Forever Home.")

Unleashed dogs also are routinely allowed to run wild, invade private residences, and kill the landlords' cats with impunity. (See Cat Defender posts of March 24, 2010 and July 18, 2015 entitled, respectively, "Seven-Month-Old Bailey Is Fed to a Lurcher by a Group of Sadistic Teens in Search of Cheap Thrills in Northern Ireland" and "A Blackpudlian Thrill Seeker Who Sicced Her Pit Bull on Regi and Then Laughed Off Her Fat Ass as He Tore Him Apart Receives a Customary Clean Bill of Health from the Courts.") 

Because the politicians and police always have bent over backwards in order to protect dogs and their lawless owners, even individuals are no longer safe from these types of unprovoked attacks. For example,  great-grandmother Lucille Downer from Rowley Regis in the West Midlands was killed by a pair of American bulldogs belonging to her next-door neighbor on April 2nd. They, too, were later liquidated by the authorities. (See the BBC, April 3, 2021, "Rowley Regis Dog Attack: Woman, Eighty-Five, Killed by Dogs That Got Through Fence Hole" and the Halesowen News of Stourbridge, Worcestershire, April 6, 2021, "Dogs Which Killed Great-Grandmother in Boundary Avenue, Rowley Regis, Put Down.")

Whereas there are not any known valid reasons for allowing fox hunting to continue, there are at least six  perfectly good arguments in favor of outlawing it in all its incarnations once and for all time. First of all, the best reason of all for banning it would be in order to save the lives of cats, livestock, and wildlife adversely impacted by it, such as badgers, otters, and rabbits.

Secondly, a workable ban not only would spare the lives of countless foxes but additionally go a long way toward ending the demonization of the species as not having any tangible value and therefore often being  dismissed as vermin. It also would save the lives of an infinitesimal number of kits that foxhunters feed to their dogs in order to accustom them to hunting foxes.

It is, after all, a foregone conclusion the English jurists are not about to punish the breeders of hounds who commit such contemptible offenses. For instance, Birmingham Magistrates' Court District Judge Joanna Dickens refused to punish Paul Oliver and Hannah Rose of the now disbanded South Herefordshire Hunt in Wormelow, ten kilometers south of Hereford, after they had been convicted in 2019 of feeding four live kits to their wretched dogs.

Instead, stench-of-the-bench Dickens only fined them £300 in court costs plus a victim's surcharge of £115. Best of all as far as they were concerned, she allowed them to remain in business.

Carly Jose in Her Garden with Her Grief and Memories

"I think the chance of any reoccurrence is minimal," she mindlessly declared to The Independent on June 11, 2019. (See "Fox Hunter Who Fed Live Cubs to His Dogs Spared Jail and Avoids Ban on Keeping Animals.") "I also  take into account that to disqualify them from being in control of animals would cause them to loose their current employment and any hope of future work, as this is their livelihood."

The reason that judges enjoy even so much as a scintilla of respect is attributable to the fact that few members of the general public either ever read their written opinions or sit in their courtrooms and listen to the ingrained prejudices and special interests that they pass off as justice. For example, Dickens certainly does no have any earthly way of knowing that her buddies Oliver and Rose are not going to kill additional kits. In fact, the opposite would seem to be a good deal more likely.

Also, it is odd to say the least that she is so concerned about the killers' financial well-being. Could it be that she is getting a cut of the action?

As any fool knows, judges normally do no give so much as a rat's ass about the finances of the poor that they consign to the stir without so much as a second thought. On the contrary, it is only the members of their own social set that they not only bend the laws in order to set free but in the process cry a proverbial river over any financial reverses that they may have incurred as the result of their criminal conduct. Yet, societies all over the world call that justice.

Thirdly, banning foxhunting would saves the lives of countless hounds. After all, it is well-known that  foxhunters only go to the trouble and expense of breeding them so that they can turn around and later kill them off once they have become either too old or too sickly in order to hunt. The remainder of them are mowed down by motorists. All totaled, it is estimated that foxhunters kill, by one means or another, three-thousand hounds annually. 

Fourthly, banning this cruel sport would also put some much needed teeth in the trespassing laws while simultaneously protecting private property, the land, crops, and fences. Fifthly, banning foxhunting would put an end to the hunts' irksome disruption of traffic and the appropriation of public thoroughfares for their very own private, nefarious use. 

Sixthly, foxhunting is an all-too-obvious symbol of the existence of a divisive social class system. Whereas ending this barbarism would be a positive step in the right direction, the English, Welsh, and Scots dearly love the monarchy, the House of Lords, and all the trappings that go with operating a class society so changing things, such as putting an end to foxhunting, is bound to be met by stiff resistance.

Carly Jose and her supporters have introduced the Public and Animal Safety Bill of 2021, known more popularly as "Mini's Law" and which would outlaw foxhunting and the exercising of hounds in residential neighborhoods as well as in public places, but "Porous" Boris and his henchmen already have turned thumbs down on the measure.

"The police can take action under the Dogs Act of 1871 where dogs are out of control and dangerous to other animals," is how that his Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) belatedly responded on May 24th according to Keep the Ban. "This government will not amend the Hunting Act."

The rather obvious problem with DEFRA's sottise is that the police seldom, if ever, enforce either the Dogs Act or the Hunting Act. Both the House of Commons and 10 Downing Street are accordingly in cahoots with foxhunters, the owner of vicious dogs, and the police. 

Mini's Long-Suffering and Noble Heart Has Been Stilled 

Even so, supporters of Mini's Law have until October 29th in order to collect one-hundred-thousand online signatures. Regrettably, at last check they had only managed to garner slightly more than thirty-five-thousand.

Should they somehow be able to reach that goal, the bill then would be considered by the fifteen-member Petitions Committee. Following that, it might be debated in Parliament and then put to a public referendum, much like Brexit. 

The chances of any of that coming to fruition are, unfortunately, slim indeed. For example, after an unleashed dog had killed his beloved Sparkle on August 22, 2019 in the Sudden section of Rochdale in Greater Manchester, fifteen-year-old Jacob Hazley started a petition at change.org in order to try and get a small measure of justice for her but he, predictably, got stiffed by the bigwigs. (See Cat Defender post of September 22, 2019 entitled "Sparkle Is Killed on the Front Stoop of Her House by an Unleashed Dog in the Latest of Centuries-Old Deadly Attacks That Bear the Unmistakable Imprimatur of the House of Commons.")

That is pretty much the situation all over the world in that the politicians are deaf to the plaintive cries and concerns of the people that they are supposed to be serving. There is not really any solution to this dilemma other than revolution but there are not too many people who are willing to destroy a society in order to save it. 

Nevertheless, aggrieved citizens ought to at least ponder boycotting elections, politicians, parties, and those capitalists that are working against their best interests. Most citizens may have little choice other than to put up with the abuse but they are certainly not under any compulsion to finance it as well.

Jose apparently was able to retrieve Mini's corpse and, hopefully, she is now buried in the back garden that she so loved. Plus, she still has her three children, an assortment of animals, and a cat named Todd who recently has been ill.

So, she will eventually get through these difficult times but she never again will be able to feel safe in her Grundstück so long as foxhunting is allowed to continue. Likewise, she never will be able to safely let out Todd and any of her other animals even into her own gardens. Higher and sturdier fences would help to keep her, her family, and her animals safe but there is not any silver bullet when it comes to thwarting the cruel machinations  lawless foxhunters and their bloodthirsty hounds. 

She never will be able to replace Mini, however. She was a special cat who had suffered mightily and had overcome much during her all-too-short lifetime.

So, as she relaxes in her back garden on these warm summer evenings Jose may no longer have Mini by her side but she at least has her memories of her for succor. Hopefully, they will be enough in order to sustain her until the day dawns when another cat, perhaps either one who is homeless or on death row at a shelter, comes into her shattered life and repairs the fissures in her broken heart.

Photos: Carly Jose (Mini on a fence, with Jose, and asleep), The Mirror (pack of hounds, huntsman gathering up Mini, and making his getaway), Charlie Knight of the BBC (huntsman flinging Mini's body over a fence), Harry Cockburn of The Independent ( Celia Hammond with two of her cats),  Kent Hunt Sabs (hounds killing a fox), Rebecca Bingham (Spider), Brighton Hunt Saboteurs (Huntswoman whipping a protester) and Greg Martin of Cornwall Live (Jose alone in her garden).