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Case Snapshot

Case ID: 9164

Classification: Beating, Shooting

Animal: cat

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Animal was offleash or loose

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CONVICTED: Was justice served?

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Case #9164 Rating: 2.8 out of 5

Cat shot, fatally beaten, dumped in garbage can
Livingston, MT (US)

Incident Date: Monday, Jun 5, 2006
County: Park

Disposition: Convicted
Case Images: 2 files available

Defendant/Suspect: James Durfey

Case Updates: 1 update(s) available

Charges were filed against a Livingston man in City Court on June 26, 2006 regarding the killing of a pet cat in a neighborhood where felines have reportedly gone missing for several years.

City Attorney Bruce Becker said that Livingston resident Jim Durfey has been charged with one count of cruelty to animals and one count of illegally discharging a firearm within city limits. The charges came about after Bonnie and Parke Goodman, who live on East Gallatin Street, began to wonder where their big black cat Bernie had gone; suspecting the worst, they began a search of the neighborhood garbage cans, according to a June 13, 2006 story in the Livingston Enterprise, after which the couple "found him dead, his body mangled."

"The truth is, I only checked one garbage can, because I knew which one to check," Bonnie told The Pioneer. "Bernie's body was hidden in a bag of trash at the bottom of the can." The Goodmans then called both the Livingston police and Animal Control, and took their dead pet to a Livingston veterinarian, who told them that Bernie had died from a crushed skull after first being shot. That information only compounded the pain the Goodmans felt from the loss of their pet.

"Parke and I don't have kids, and we really cherish our pets," Bonnie told the Enterprise. "Bernie was our baby." She said that the big black cat was very friendly and approachable, which may have been his downfall; when she first moved into the East Gallatin Street neighborhood where she and her husband live, she was alerted by other neighbors that pet cats often turned up missing there,and to keep close track of her own cats. "Dozens and dozens of cats have disappeared around here," Bonnie said, adding that neighbors had also told her that some of those pets had turned up dead on her property, or shot yet still alive, before she moved there.
"No one would ever report it.....I don't know why," she said. She and Parke also don't understand why, in their view, the Livingston police aren't taking the killing of their pet cat more seriously.

"There was a bigger investigation over broken tomato plants in our neighborhood than there was about Bernie," said Parke. He said that his cousin's husband, a sergeant in the Los Angeles Police Department, was also mystified by the lack of attention paid to Bernie's killing by both law enforcement and the media: the big-city policeman was in the small town of Livingston visiting the Goodmans during the ordeal. "Without a doubt this guy would be in jail in LA awaiting trial had this incident happened there," said Parke. "We would have been the lead story on all the networks...they take this stuff seriously there....it's been a real eye-opener." "I'm just afraid the killing of pet cats won't stop...they'll just be stuffed in a different trash can next time," said Bonnie, adding that in the wake of Bernie's death and its alleged cause, her neighborhood just seems scarier to her now.

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References

• « MT State Animal Cruelty Map
  « More cases in Park County, MT

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