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" October 7, 2008

WASHTENAW COUNTY, Mich. -- After four months of ongoing investigations, rulings against four children who beat and tortured a pet cat are likely to proceed through the juvenile court system.

The two sets of siblings, two boys and two girls between the ages of eight and 11, beat the cat with a stick and broke its back.

Then they sodomized the female tabby, who had recently had kittens, with a butter knife.

The children were unsupervised at the time of the attack. One parent later found the crippled cat and took it to a veterinarian, who euthanized it.

Tanya Hilgendorf, executive director of the Humane Society of Huron Valley, says the children showed little remorse in the interviews conducted by Humane Society investigators.

"What they told us was that it was 'cool,' " Hilgendorf said.

"That was the reason they gave. What I have known and studies have shown is that children involved in hurting animals have often been victims of violence themselves."

A child under the age of seven can't be held "legally or criminally responsible" for any action, Donald Ray, first assistant prosecutor for Washtenaw County, said.

Ray, who specializes in juvenile court procedures, said the children's consequences could "run the range of the court placing them in counseling, detention, or placed on probation."

"They could do a number of things in efforts to rehabilitate the child," he said.

Dale Bartlett, the deputy manager of animal cruelty at the Humane Society of the United States, says that the case might extend past a basic animal cruelty case, as "children who are cruel to animals often exhibit the most severe conduct problems."

"Killing and sexually assaulting an animal is very frightening conduct and we would say that any children who are discovered doing that kind of thing should undergo psychiatric evaluation," he said.

Barlett cited a 2002 study, published in the academic journal "Society and Animals," which shows that 96 percent of people who engaged in sexual activity with non-human animals were also sex offenders against humans.

"I'm not saying that these four children will grow up to be sexual predators or anything, but it does happen," he said.

"Studies have found a very high correlation between sexual abuse of animals and sexual homicidal perpetrators."

Hilgendorf says that Humane Society investigators recommended therapy for the children, whom they think are not to blame for their actions.

"Any child who commits an act of violence like this is in need of help," Hilgendorf said. "We hope that as the case proceeds, that proper intervention, care and help will be provided to them."

Ray wasn't as quick to jump to a conclusion that this case reflects some sort of tainted emotional history.

"I don't see that correlation between animal abuse and child abuse necessarily," he said. "The kids may have learned that behavior somewhere, but I don't do any studies on it."

A court date has yet to be scheduled.

Another gruesome case of children committing animal abuse also surfaced in Australia last Wednesday.

A seven-year-old boy jumped a fence at the Alice Springs Reptile Centre and killed 13 animals, mainly lizards, in 35 minutes.

He also fed some live animals to Terry, an 11-foot saltwater crocodile.

The zoo is now considering a lawsuit against the boy's parents.

"We're just horrified that anyone could do this, and saddened by the age of the child," Rex Neindorf, the zoo's director, told The UK Times. "He will just get worse and worse and worse –- by the time he is 10 he will be a hardened criminal."

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The Detroit News and The UK Times contributed to this article"

http://www.zootoo.com/petnews/petcatbeatensodomizedbyfourchi

That is one of the most disturbing things I have ever read. Possibly even more disturbing than the act itself is the fact that the kids will get nothing more than counseling and probation. That means they'll be free to walk the streets. And even though we know they're dangerous, we know they're sociopaths, and we know they will kill someone, there's nothing we can do about it because of their age. How horrific that we have to just sit here and wait a few years until they kill their first human before we can actually put them away. If I were their mother, I would be terrified to have them in my house. I have to say I'd probably consider smothering them in their sleep to save their innocent future victims from a painful and horrific death. And if I didn't have the courage to actually do it, I would put them up for adoption and move out of state. There's no way I'm going to sleep with a known serial killer right down the hall.