Cat shot with bow and arrow
Austin, TX (US)Incident Date: Sunday, Jul 31, 2005
County: Travis
Disposition: Open
Suspect(s) Unknown - We need your help!
Lee County Animal Control workers are dealing with what they call "an extreme case of animal cruelty." They want to know who shot a young cat with a 2-foot arrow.
Lee County Sheriff's Department Investigator Charles Kothmann took the call from a woman who found the cat.
"She stated she had a cat in her driveway that had been shot with an arrow. I thought, 'That's interesting, how does she know it was an arrow?' She told me the arrow was still in the cat," Kothmann said.
So, animal authorities were called in to help the cat.
"I didn't know what to imagine, I thought, 'I better take my drugs along because I'll probably have to euthanize it in the field because it's obviously probably suffering,' " Lee County Animal Control Officer Ethel Spence said.
To everyone's surprise the cat survived.
"I was shocked that it wasn't dead," Kothmann said.
The arrow missed the cat's major organs. Shelter workers named him Robin Hood.
"I thought, 'I can't put him down. He's lived this long, it's just God's will he survives and deserves another chance,' " Spence said.
Not every animal is as lucky as Robin Hood.
Nine to 10 cases of animal cruelty have been reported in Lee County since October.
The animals include cats, horses and dogs. Pitbulls are big targets.
City and county ordinances help control animal abuse. But in many rural areas, like Lee County, those kind of rules just don't exist.
"I think every animal control officer in the country has the same issue. If you don't have the ordinances in place to back you up, then you have no power to enforce it," Spence said.
The person who shot Robin Hood may never be caught.
Rather than putting Robin Hood up for adoption, the shelter will probably keep him as a shelter mascot. References« TX State Animal Cruelty Map
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