Animal party angered by new delay in Billy trial

The Animal party has censured the delay in the trial of three defendants accused of throwing a dog alive into a hotel’s cardboard crusher in the summer of 2014.

The trial was meant to go ahead on Thursday but it was adjourned, the party said.

The three defendants, the hotel’s manager and the two employees who allegedly threw Billy alive into the machine, were charged with causing injury to animals and causing brutal death to animals.

The first hearing was set for November 2014, but one of the defendants, a Bulgarian national, did not show up. Another worked abroad. The case was adjourned for February 2015.

In February’s hearing, the defendants pleaded not guilty and the case was adjourned for last Thursday. The party said has now been adjourned for November 11, but did not provide details.

“If courts delay so much for a case that made the news worldwide, mobilising hundreds of people, local and foreign, then what must we expect,” a party statement said.

“What do we tell the people who are outraged? What do we tell society and the rest of the world watching us?”

The party said it wants answers from the attorney-general and the justice minister.

The cause of Billy’s death was brain haemorrhage caused by severe traumas to the base of his skull. The two employees claimed that they thought the dog was dead before they threw him in the machine.

Tsokkos Hotels, the company that manages the hotel, had said that the manager did not instruct the two men to treat the stray dog the way they did, and that they took it upon themselves to dump the dog in the crusher, which they claimed was not operational. They were fired after the incident, while the manager was suspended.

 

 

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