On Friday, June 21, a resident of the commune found her dog killed by a bullet. An act of cruelty that is far from being isolated in the commune since no fewer than four domestic dogs suffered the same fate, without it being possible to know the number of stray dogs that were shot. A phenomenon that raises the question of the number of people armed with trigger-happy guns.
On Thursday, June 20, Aurore* noticed that her dog Vatika had not come home, unlike her father’s dog with whom she spends her days. The resident of Fontaine Saint-Leu started looking for her dog and asked the question to her neighbor whom she met. He simply told her that he had scared her away because she was running after the guinea fowl.
The next day, while going to cut grass for her kids, she discovered her dog dead in the grass. The animal has a circular hole in its lungs from which blood flows, as well as its nose and mouth. She contacts the gendarmerie, who alerts the TCO to come and collect the body. The agents arrive the next day and tell him that no veterinarian will autopsy the dog during the weekend. She was contacted by the veterinary clinic within a week, which confirmed that Vatika had indeed been shot. Aurore therefore went to file a complaint.
For Aurore and her family, there is no doubt that her neighbor is the perpetrator. She had also noticed traces of blood in front of his house on the day of the disappearance, but had thought that it was the blood of roosters that had fought. Since then, she realized that a stray dog in the neighborhood had also disappeared.
“She was my first dog. She had just been spayed three weeks before.”, she gets excited. Despite the pain, during a family picnic, she goes to take in an abandoned puppy in the forest of L’Étang-Salé.
Several cases recorded in one year
This dog killed by gunfire is far from being an isolated case in the town. Last April, Jasper was found injured in the rear. Taken to a veterinarian, the latter will notice that the dog has been shot. He died a few days later of septicemia.
Last March, a municipal employee of Saint-Leu was convicted of shooting a dog that he accused of attacking his cats. A defense that could have been heard if the man was not known for being easy to threaten humans.
A year ago, it was Delphine who went through this painful experience. That day, her roommate went for a trail run with her dog Moka. Half an hour later, she received a call from her roommate in tears who told her that her dog had just been shot. The person who fired the shot was an octogenarian who had already shot another dog some time earlier. The dog was letting his chickens loose on the trail and was shooting buckshot at the dogs that passed by. The person who fired the shot died shortly before his trial.
The trauma is very present for Delphine, who took several months to recover from the violent disappearance of her dog. For a long time, she was torn between hatred for the shooter and a form of understanding. “If he loved his chickens like I loved my dog, I could understand his reaction. Then, I tell myself that when you love your chickens, you protect them and you make sure that they are not free on a path where predators can roam”she emphasizes.
“It’s a snake biting its own tail.”
What worries him is to say to himself that “Hyper-dangerous people have guns and are trigger-happy. Justice must ensure that they have the right to have weapons, especially when they are trigger-happy. Ultimately, it’s all the better that it’s on animals, but we can fear that it will be humans one day”she warns.
For Aurore and Delphine, this cruel behavior towards animals is mainly generational. The perpetrators are often seniors for whom the place of the dog in society is the equal of a piece of furniture.
“I remain convinced that if animal protection were much better managed on a larger scale, we would also avoid these sad news stories. There is too much wandering and animal wandering, too much abandonment, too little identification and sterilization. It’s a snake that bites its tail: chicken owners see their chickens killed by stray dogs, so they end up killing the dogs that pass by. If they don’t have masters, no one cares and no one hears about it. But if these dogs had a family, it would affect more.”analyse Delphine.
A much larger problem than it seems and which could ultimately lead to a much more serious tragedy.
In the meantime, you can report any case of animal abuse to 3677.
*First name
Animal abuse: Contact 3677
