Animal Abuse

This is so hideous, I don't think I can even comment right now...

Scales of justice tilt to the scaly
By Cliff Ward Special to the Chicago Tribune
August 22, 2008

A judge had a different idea Thursday when prosecutors suggested community service work in an animal shelter for a West Dundee woman who stabbed her estranged husband's pet lizards.

"That would be sort of like putting the defendant in a candy store," said Kane County Judge Grant Wegner, who instead ordered Sara Tinsley to spend 50 hours collecting roadkill.

Tinsley, 38, pleaded guilty to aggravated animal cruelty in May. She was arrested in April 2007 and later admitted that she stabbed the two bearded dragon lizards with a kitchen knife after a dispute with her estranged husband the day before.Police were called and found one lizard dead. But the other was still alive in a garbage can at the couple's West Dundee home. The reptile survived after emergency surgery.

Tinsley was ordered to work with a road crew collecting dead animals as part of her sentence. She also was told to pay $604 in veterinary bills, $375 in fees and court costs. She must undergo an anger-management evaluation and was placed on probation for 18 months.

"I'm very, very sorry for my actions," Tinsley told the judge. "I've been around animals my whole life and never had an incident."Prosecutors presented to the court a letter from Thomas Davis, a member of the Chicago Herpetological Society, who urged the judge to treat injuries to lizards as seriously as he would more traditional pets.

"I can tell you from experience the tears I cried over a 5-foot water monitor were every bit as hard as the one I cried over a 125-pound Rottweiler. . . . Scales, fur and feathers—it all hurts just the same when your pet dies," he wrote.

Tinsley's former husband, Harry Tinsley, 38, attended the sentencing. He wore a T-shirt emblazoned with a picture of a bearded dragon lizard and a caption that read, "Here's lickin' at you, kid." It was clear he still grieved for his lizards, Ethel, who died, and the surviving Fred.

In a letter to the court, he wrote, "Ethel especially loved strawberries, which we found hilarious because her hips would get red and it looked like she was wearing lipstick."

Attorney Todd Cohen, who represented Sara Tinsley, said his client had led a law-abiding life but snapped after the domestic incident. The couple were divorcing at the time, prosecutors said. Harry Tinsley pleaded guilty to domestic battery in March. The couple have divorced since then, and both have remarried."There was some justice done," Harry Tinsley said. "But I don't think it was enough for what she did."

Can you say Death Penalty kids? I knew you could.