The court imposed a fine of 50,000 euros, including 25,000 suspended, considering that the systematic cutting of the animals’ tails was an act of mistreatment.
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The owners of a pig farm supplying the Herta brand were sentenced on Wednesday April 6 to a fine of 50,000 euros, including 25,000 suspended for “bad treatment of animals”, by the correctional court of Moulins (Allier). The court considered that the systematic cutting of the animals’ tails was an act of abuse.
This farm of 9,000 pigs located in Limoise (Allier) had been pinned in videos of the L214 association. Images broadcast in 2020 and then in early 2021 showed caged sows lacking space to give birth or nurse their young, pigs wading through their excrement, deprived of water, some of which had their legs stuck in the slots of the gratings covering the floor. .
“It’s a very harsh decision. My clients are sentenced for a criminal offence, they are told that the mistreatment is intentional. We are criminalizing a breeding practice which concerns 99% of European breeders”, reacted the lawyer for the owners, Me Paul Morrier. Routine tail docking, called tail docking, is a “preventive act” practiced by a large majority of breeders, to prevent pigs from injuring each other by biting their tails, according to Me Paul Morrier.
The L214 association, for its part, welcomed a conviction “historical”. “For the first time, justice condemns this practice, prohibited for nearly 20 years by the decree of January 16, 2003” but still practiced, underlines the association in a press release.