Two teenagers given severe reprimand

Two Siggiewi teenagers who doused a dog with petrol and set it on fire were yesterday put on probation for three years.

Darren Fenech, 19, and a sixteen-year-old boy whose name cannot be published because he is still a minor, pleaded guilty to cruelty to animals in Siggiewi on July 2, 2001, at about 12.45 p.m.

Magistrate Antonio Mizzi heard how police were informed that a dog was badly burnt and needed the assistance of a vet.

People who lived in the Siggiewi area where the dog was found told police that the dog, black with a few brown patches, had been roaming the neighbourhood for about three months.

They said they saw Fenech and the boy take the dog away in a car and the dog later returned all burnt.

Police informed Dr Victor Vassallo who examined the dog. The vet said the dog had a strong smell of burning and the skin on his head had been burnt off.

He administered some medicine to cool down the dog whose temperature was higher than 107°C because the thermometer only showed a maximum temperature of 107°C.

The dog died because his main organs collapsed by the time the dose took effect.

On handing down judgment, Magistrate Mizzi said he had heard a probation officer explain that the boys had matured over the past year.

The magistrate told the boys this was a very serious case and had it not been for the pre-sentencing report he would have jailed them.

He told them that court was not the place for boys of their age and warned them that if they breached any of the probation conditions during the next three years he would jail them.

Police Superintendent Paul Sammut and Inspector Sylvana Zrinzo prosecuted.

Dr Ian Farrugia appeared for Fenech while Dr Joseph Giglio appeared for the boy.