The Guardian 8/11/05: Childhood cruelty to animals may signal violence in future

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Childhood cruelty to animals may signal violence in future

 

Rosie Cowan, crime correspondent

Thursday August 11, 2005

 

Guardian

Childhood cruelty to animals can be an early

warning of a propensity for violence against

other people, a report published yesterday said.

 

The research wing of animal rights charity, Peta

(People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals),

has compiled a study of the links between severe

animal abuse by children who later committed acts

of extreme violence - in some cases, murder.

 

Several cases have been well documented. Thomas

Hamilton, the Dunblane killer, enjoyed shooting

animals and squashing rabbits' heads beneath car

wheels as a youth. Robert Thompson, who was 10

years old when he and John Venables killed

two-year-old Jamie Bulger, pulled the heads off

live birds.

 

David Mulcahy and John Duffy, the so-called

Railway Rapists, who raped and murdered three

women and raped or assaulted 12 more in the 70s

and 80s, shared a teenage fascination with

tormenting animals.

 

Peta, which has sent its report to the Crown

Prosecution Service, MPs and all UK police

forces, believes there should be closer

cooperation between police and social services

and organisations such as the RSPCA, so that

those at risk of becoming dangerous criminals can

be spotted, and perhaps helped, as early as

possible.

 

The FBI, which already uses reports of animal

abuse to analyse criminal threat potential, has

found a childhood history of cruelty to animals

is prevalent among many serial rapists and

murderers.

 

Robert Ressler, founder of the FBI's behavioural

sciences unit, said: " These are the kids who

never learned that it was wrong to poke a puppy's

eyes out. " Alan Bradley, an FBI special agent,

said: " Some offenders kill animals as a rehearsal

for targeting human victims and may kill or

torture animals because, to them, animals

symbolically represent people. "

 

The Peta study found abuse of pets in the home

was often linked to domestic violence, with adult

perpetrators tormenting family pets, as well as

children and partners.

 

Peta's research found that some children in

abusive homes copy the abusers' behaviour.

" Children in violent homes are characterised by

frequently participating in pecking-order

battering, in which they maim or kill an animal.

Domestic violence is the most common background

for childhood cruelty to animals. "

 

Scotland Yard's homicide prevention unit, set up

last year to examine the psychological profile of

violent offenders in an effort to thwart future

crime, is also interested in the links between

various patterns of cruelty.

 

Laura Richards, a senior behavioural consultant

with the unit, said there was a definite link

between domestic violence and stranger rape.

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005

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