Man who hacked live cow, chopped off its leg as his friend chanted 'I want meat!' escapes jail time
An Australian man who was accused of hacking off the legs and flesh of a live cow while his friend yelled "I want meat! I want meat!" has been found guilty of stealing but escaped a conviction on animal cruelty charges.
The Darwin Local Court heard this past week how the disturbing incident unfolded after 34-year-old Anthony Spencer, and his friends 24-year-old Angela Wood, 25-year-old Roy Young and 46-year-old Glen Spack Petherick, drove down to a cattle yard owned by the Australian Agricultural Company on July 20 last year.
When they arrived at the yard in their Toyota LandCruiser, they spotted a Brahman cow, brutally attacked it and knocked it unconscious with an ax. They then chopped away its loin and its front leg before fleeing the scene.
The animal was still alive and regained consciousness soon enough, at which point pastoralists nearby shot it in the head to put the animal out of its misery.
The group had returned to their car by then, with the court hearing that Young was in the passenger seat and yelling "I want meat! I want meat!" prompting them to return to the now-dead cow where they chopped off its rear leg.
After committing the horrendous act, they fled the scene. But they had been spotted, with one witness stating that they had never seen such cruelty done to a defenseless animal.
Speaking during the hearing, Spencer's lawyer Nicola MacCarron admitted her client witnessed the slaughter but insisted he did not butcher the animal himself.
"They proposed going for a ride," she said. "He concedes that he was there and part of it. He says he didn't actually butcher it."
She argued that Spencer, who had already spent 33 days in prison for failing to appear in court in December last year, did not deserve to go back behind bars because it was his first offense in years.
The judge ultimately heeded MacCarron's suggestion and sentenced Spencer to 150 hours of community service.
Wood and Young both previously pleaded guilty to stealing, with Judge Elisabeth Armitage sentencing the former to three months jail in September. The charges against Petherick had to be dropped after it emerged that he was charged outside the six-month time limit.