After pleading guilty, French international defender Kurt Zouma was sentenced on Wednesday June 1 by British justice. He will have to provide 180 hours of community service for having mistreated his cat, after the broadcast of a video that went viral which had provoked indignant reactions.
The judge described his actions as “shameful and reprehensible”. The 27-year-old West Ham player has also been banned from owning a cat for five years, the Thames Magistrates Court in London has ruled.
The video, where he was seen kicking and slapping his animal, was filmed on February 6 and shared on Snapchat by his brother Yoan, 24, also a footballer. Dsince publication, there have been “an upsurge of people hitting cats and posting the footage on various social media,” had underlined the prosecutor, Tuesday, May 24, in court.
The player’s two cats have since been handed over to animal welfare society RSPCA, which had launched proceedings for Kurt and Yoan Zouma to be prosecuted under animal welfare legislation.
The London club had not suspended their player and had even made him play the evening of the revelation of the affair, provoking a huge wave of protest. West Ham had assured that, according to the information available to the club, the cats had not “suffered no physical injury”.
The player was finally fined nearly 300 000 euros, the highest possible, inflicted by his club. This sum was donated to animal protection associations, according to West Ham. For his part, thesports equipment manufacturer Adidas broke a sponsorship contract with him.