Monkey cruelty couple banned from keeping animals (From Stourbridge News)

Monkey cruelty couple banned from keeping animals

6:35pm Thursday 12th January 2012 in Local

A STOURBRIDGE couple who sold a pet monkey in a hamster cage on a car park behind a chip shop have been banned from keeping animals for life and hit with a hefty court bill.

Julie Jones and Lee Powell were sentenced at Dudley Magistrates Court today (Thursday) after being found guilty at a two-day trial in December of causing unnecessary suffering to the four-month-old marmoset.

The pair, from Sunderland Drive, were ordered to pay £5,427 prosecution costs and to carry out 300 hours of unpaid work as part of a one-year community payback scheme.

Disqualified from keeping animals for life, they were also ordered to hand over their remaining four marmosets to the RSPCA and to cover the £120 costs of collection and transportation.

Jane Rymer, chairman of the magistrates, also ordered the pair to pay £650 to pensioner Sheila Lister from Essington who bought the monkey after answering an advert that Jones and Powell had placed in a newspaper.

She said the sentence reflected the degree of harm caused to the monkey which prosecution solicitor Nick Sutton, for the RSPCA, said had “suffered so profoundly”.

In an earlier hearing - the court was told just days after being bought by Mrs Lister the animal was handed over to the RSPCA with seven fractures and barely able to walk - and it had to be put to sleep.

Its crippled condition was confirmed to have been caused by a metabolic bone disease (osteoporosis) caused by nutritional deficiencies due to inadequate diet.

Jones, aged 41, and Powell, aged 50, denied two charges each of causing unnecessary suffering to a protected animal and a further two each of failing to ensure the welfare of the marmoset.

They claimed at trial they thought the animal’s diet, which included baby food, meal worms, yoghurt and marshmallows, was sufficient to prevent disease occuring.

But the court was told marmosets living in captivity must be provided with adequate calcium and Vitamin D3 for healthy bones.

Mr Sutton, for the RSPCA, said the couple "must have known" the animal was crippled when they sold it.

Simon Hanns, defending, said "mistakes have clearly been made" but he added that Jones, a credit controller, and Powell, a tarmacer, were “hardworking individuals” of previous good character who would be unlikely to find themselves before the court again.

RSPCA inspector Jackie Hickman said afterwards the case had been “very distressing” but she welcomed the sentence.

She said: “It’s a fitting result. Selling a baby monkey from the back of a car in a hamster cage on a carpark was in itself highly inappropriate.

“Monkeys have an enhanced capacity to suffer and it was totally unnecessary in this case.”

She said she hoped the sentence would send out a clear message to those keeping pet monkeys to ensure they are able to provide specialist care.