HORSE CRUELLY TREATED

Evening Star, Issue 22524, 17 December 1936, Page 16

HORSE CRUELLY TREATED

DRIVEN WITH BROKEN LEG PECULIAR BELIEFS OF OLD MAORIS [Per United Press Association.] HASTINGS, December 16. That there was an old Maori belief that broken limbs could be mended by treatment with the leaves of trees such as the kowhai and gums was a fact mentioned in the Hastings Police Court this morning by two Maoris concerned in a case in which Thompson Hokianga, aged 66, of Te Hauke, was charged with causing unnecessary suffering to a horse by driving it while it was suffering from a brolron foreleg. The information was laid by Mr W. A. Stephens, the inspector of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. The defendant pleaded not guilty, and was fined £2 and costs (£6 15s). It was stated that the horse had got out of a paddock and 'had wandered on a road. It had been struck by a car, and a leg had been broken. The defendant removed the horse from an adjacent ipaddock, into which it had been put after the accident, to his own farm three miles away. It was contended that this had caused the animal extreme pain. No treatment had been given to the horse. “ This is a difficult case,” remarked the magistrate (Mr J. Miller). 11 Natives of his age have peculiar beliefs, and we must get the psychology of Natives of this man’s age. The cruelty w r as mostly in the method adopted in conveying the horse from the scene of the accident to the defendants home. If this had been a European it would have been a question of gaol. It is a case of grave cruelty. I am not satisfied' with the defendant’s statement. The treatment given to the horse was not proper, and he must be found guilty. I have no difficulty in finding this, but what is difficult is the determination of the degree of cruelty. There is not sufficient proof of the extent of this. He might have had some belief that he could have cured the horse, but there is no excuse for leading a horse in the manner in which it was done.”'