Amersham Horses Latest Update

zebs

zebs

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Story Last Updated 07/04/2008 14:42:00


(ILPH) is appalled at the implications of the decision made at the plea hearing of John James Gray, and co-defendants, at Oxford Magistrates Court on Friday 4th April.

We are devastated that 29 ponies and donkeys will be returned to James Gray and that the remaining 82 horses taken from Spindles Farm in January this year are to be sold on his behalf at public auction. We will be fully supporting the RSPCA who are pursuing all other legal avenues in order to secure the future welfare of the animals involved.

This is the worst possible outcome for the horses and for our staff but is by no means the end of this matter. In addition to the legal efforts to try to reverse last week’s decision by the Courts, Mr James Gray, and co-defendants, will be appearing at Oxford Magistrates Court again on Monday 28th April for another a pre-trial hearing for the criminal case being brought against them by the RSPCA, where a date for a trial will be set.

How on earth can a magistrate take that decision ????? Words fail me :angy:
 
It really does beggar belief doesn't it, esp since the cruelty case hasn't even reached court yet.
Some lawyer somewhere has made a giant cock-up - or the magistrate needs a brain op

RSPCA Report on the case

This was on our East Anglia local news as some of the horses are being rehabilitated in the region.
The staff who had cared for them were just about in tears. The RSPCA were pleading for no 'action' to be taken against Gray whilst they pursued legal channels, but I can't see the wilder fringes of the Animal Rights mob allowing Gray to get these ponies and donkeys back... they do have their uses!

http://www.horseandhound.co.uk/news/397/198899.html

I have plenty of quarrels with the RSPCA [esp since I've got involved with DogLost] - but it does make a nonsense of the work they do if animals can just be returned even in such obvious cases of outrageous neglect and cruelty.

The magistrate, who I note has a Sikh name, clearly knows nothing about animals at all - you only had to see the photos and the videos of how these poor creatures were found... and the big problem of them being sold at auction is that they could easily go for the meat trade, after the months of work which have been put into their rehabilitation
 
There is now an official website to co-ordinate a response to this turn of events.
A petition is being organised and people are asked to write to DEFRA and to their MPs

Please keep up to date with events on the website:

http://amershamhorses.com/
 
Now at 10439 signatures.

I really can't believe they're sending horses back to this man :( it really makes me sick
 
Thanks to everyone for talking about this one, and for signing the petition. Friends of ours work at the RSPCA and with the animals who have been nursed over the past weeks. They say that they were so distrustful at first but have now turned the corner and are relaly showing affacetion again and trsust. How can they have to be returned to this git or go to the sales?

Really makes my blood burn.

I just hope we get enough signatures to make something different happen. The woman who is running this is working day and night to help.

PLEASE sign this! And if you have a few minutes go to the website and you can see the sampe letter you can write to your MP to protest, all of this will help get publicity. Remember, the minutes you spend doing this could save a lot of little lifes.

Tell everyone you know and try to get it on the tv. Everyone in the media seems scared to say anything against about the judge !
 
Have emailed my chum who runs the local East Anglia press Agency

It's not feasible that someone can't be found to appeal and reverse this clearly wrong judgment
What sort of country do we live in that such barbarities can be encouraged...
 
Have signed the petition, now over 12,600 signatures.

The case is utterly disgusting, over 30 horses dead and now the decision to return a lot of the animals that remain alive back to their depraved owners. You really couldn't make it up,could you?

The magistrate, a psychopath named Sandeep Kainth, should be stripped of his job and deported without delay.
 
I've mailed round the link to everyone in my mailbox!

There's also a lot of debate going on on the Horse and Hound forum

(www.horseandhound.co.uk/forums for anyone interested) - quite a few people have been mailing in to Channel 4 following the mention of the case on the Morning Line today (not sure if anyone here posts there also) and apparently Tania Stevenson has mailed back to somebody saying they'll try and get a link to the petition on the CH4 website :clap:
 
Firstly, if this hearing was held in a Magistrates Court, the Magistrate would have been clearly advised as the Law and what he could and could not do. His ethnic origin is totally irrelevant.

Secondly, I do not consider there will be any other possibility than that the animals will be sold. Now, it is well within the compass of several animal charities to ensure that they are purchased and then re-homed. Realistically, these animals won't make large sums of money.

Yes, the ###### who owns these animals will receive the proceeds but he won't hold on to the money for long, as it will be used up in legal fees.

And bearing in mind that point, if he doesn't get any proceeds from the sale of these animals, you and I will be footing the bill for his legal fees from Legal Aid anyway - and there are plenty more deserving cases than his, so I'm really pleased, if my thinking is correct, that he gets to to foot his own legal bills.
 
Where have animal aid and other anti-racing groups who affect an occasional interest in equine welfare been these last weeks?

Unlike with the Grand National, I haven't seen any reports of demonstrations outside Spindle's farm. Not heard of any radio phone-ins on the matter either.

How can that be, do you suppose?
 
11 April, 2008



Buckinghamshire horse dealer James John Gray has failed in his bid to issue an emergency injunction in the High Court in London this morning (11 April) to force the RSPCA to return 29 ponies and donkeys to him.

District Judge Sandeep Kainth ordered rescue charities to return the 11 donkeys and 18 Shetland ponies to Mr Gray on Friday 4 April.


But as yet the animals have not gone back to Mr Gray.


The RSPCA says that as they have told District Judge Kainth that they intend to appeal his decision at the High Court they should be able to hold the animals until the issue is resolved.


But this morning Mr Justice Wyn Williams refused to rule on the matter and said the case must be referred back to the district judge "as quickly as possible
 
If the case goes against James Gray, and surely it will, then the horses cease to be his property so presumably they will become the property of the RSPCA by confiscation? On the other hand as Songsheet points out, they may be seized to be sold to contribute to the court costs.

The problem is the Deputy Judge didn't realise that by ordering them all sold together the price would be dangerously surpressed. Let's hope when the cruelty case comes to court, the judge there is better advised.

I understand there was a mass picket for the court hearing in Oxford today...
and that a lot of people have written in to the judge!

Some lady has started a Facebook Group for this, but sadly she's called it something which would never be found using the search facility - no mention of 'Amersham Horses' which is how you'd logically look, and putting in his name doesn't help either as she's spelled it 'Jamies Grey'!! I did email her...
 
Good news, the decision has been reversed.

The 29 horses and donkeys will not be returned to their abusers until the RSPCA's appeal in the High Court has been heard (don't know when that will be).
 
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