Judge rejects explanation for killing cocker spaniel

A judge has rejected a Christchurch woman's claim that she shot and killed her neighbour's cocker spaniel with an air rifle because she believed it was attacking her cat.

Judge Michael Radford said he believed the woman's explanation in court was the one she wished she had given police at the time, the Court News website reports.

Yesterday he convicted Henrietta Tania Campbell, 47, on charges of wilfully ill-treating the dog and unlawfully firing an air rifle near a house.

Several animal protection campaigners wearing black Paw Justice T-shirts sat through the 90-minute hearing in Christchurch District Court.

Afterwards, the daughter of the couple who owned the dog, Althea Carbon, said it had been hard to sit in court and listen to Campbell's evidence, but the outcome was the best the family could have hoped for. MORE>>