Eight baby chicks stomped to death
Jensen, QLD (AU)

Incident Date: Sunday, Aug 29, 2010

Disposition: Open

Suspect(s) Unknown - We need your help!

The gruesome discovery of more than eight mutilated baby chickens during a morning walk has left a Jensen man disgusted.

Mike Jones stumbled across the disturbing scene in a gully at the end of his street yesterday morning.

The callous incident has coincidently occurred in the same week chickens were stolen from Aitkenvale State Primary School.

The school's bird coop was raided twice last week, just months after public outrage over the slaughter of chickens at the same school.

Mr Jones said he had counted at least eight dead birds near his Mt Kulburn Drive address which appeared to have been stomped on in the cruel act.

"They are only about four inches long standing up," he said.

"It looks like someone has put their boot into them ... their insides are all laying out beside them."

A police investigation into the first incident at Aitkenvale State School in May led to the arrest of three youths, aged 12, 15 and 16 from the Mundingburra-Aitkenvale area after two witnesses dobbed them in.

Mr Jones said his cruel find appeared to have also been inflicted by kids.

"They may have been stolen ... they definitely weren't wild turkeys," Mr Jones said.

"Surely no one would dump them, it would have been easy enough to give them away."

RSPCA Queensland spokesman Michael Beatty said Townsville was a particularly busy place for animal inspectors with regular call outs for acts of animal cruelty.

He said this incident was definitely something the RSPCA would look into and appealed for public information on the incident.

"This is obviously a difficult case," Mr Beatty said.

"The chances of finding who did it will be difficult unless we can get help from the public.

"It often does (lead the RSPCA to the cause) when we get public help."

Mr Beatty said dogs and cats were the usual victims of animal cruelty acts, with chickens quite rare.

"It's weird that someone would do this ... when it comes to the end of their laying days people would usually eat them," Mr Beattie said.

"This has the earmarks of being caused by a young adult but it's hard to say for sure.

"There's a 24 hour animal cruelty hotline. He (Mr Jones) would need to call this so we can log it as a job."

Anyone with information on this or other acts of animal cruelty should call the hotline on 1300 852188.

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