Two tv celebrities arrested and charged with animal cruelty

[Candlelight]

http://www.stuff.co.nz/entertainment/celebrities/3133855/TV-celebs-charged-with-animal-cruelty

Two stars of a British celebrity reality TV show filmed in the Australian bush have been charged with animal cruelty by NSW police.

Celebrity chef Gino D'Acampo, who won the I'm A Celebrity ... Get Me Out of Here TV contest, and soap star Stuart Manning were arrested and charged after cooking a rat and serving it with rice as a meal for fellow contestants.

D'Acampo, 33, and Manning, 30, were confronted by RSPCA officers after filming ended late last week on the TV show's set near Dungay in north eastern NSW.

The News of the World newspaper and the BBC on Sunday reported the pair were questioned about how they caught and beheaded the rat before adding it to a risotto.

They were both charged with animal cruelty offences by Murwillumbah police and ordered to appear in court on February 3.

If found guilty, the pair face up to three years in jail. The ITV network, which broadcasts the program in Britain, could also face charges.

RSPCA NSW chief inspector David O'Shannessy said it was unacceptable for the rat to have been killed for a TV show.

He said there was a "code of practice" dictating how animals could be used in theatrical productions and films.

"The killing of a rat for a performance is not acceptable," he told BBC Radio 5 Live.

"The concern is this was done purely for the cameras."

Twats.

 

[UssGlenn]

As long as they actually ate it I'm not sure I see the problem.

 

[Spot's Meow]

There have been several instances of rat-eating on Survivor. They also kill and eat chickens and other small creatures. I really can't say it's ever bothered me much. Anyone who knows me will tell you I am an animal lover, but this is going a little too far. Should we arrest people for catching a fish and eating it, even if they could have had a different meal at home? This is kind of ridiculous.

 

[Amaris]

^ Yeah, I'm an animal lover too, and while this doesn't bother me so much, they're still twats. I also feel that way about the participants and the producers of not only that show, but also Fear Factor and Survivor. It's all a bunch of folderol and twaddle.

J.

 

[freak]

I agree about the TV shows Survivor and Fear Factor. It's absolutely ridiculous to make people face their fears, so to speak in like thirty minutes! What a load of crap.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

Did they make the rat's wife and kids watch as they killed him? Did the rat accidentally die of shock while they were waterboarding him? Were the rats being entered in underground gladiatorial combat to the death? Was it a rat version of Algernon?

Where does the "cruelty" part come in compared to all of the nice "humane" ways we kill rats every day? Is beheading really that much different from breaking their spine in a trap or hitting them with a shovel?

If they had filed the proper requests or whatever is necessary to eat a rat on the show, the rat probably wouldn't have received anything less cruel than getting its head cut off then either.

Unless there's more to the story then the article lets on and they were painfully toying with the rat instead of just killing it outright, this is idiotic. Go after the people who are actually maliciously torturing animals, not a couple of reality show "stars" who killed a vermin for food, presumably at the request or with the permission of the show's producers.

 

[Gepard]

Where does the "cruelty" part come in compared to all of the nice "humane" ways we kill rats every day? Is beheading really that much different from breaking their spine in a trap or hitting them with a shovel?

This.

Also, as long as we sit around eating meat produced on factory farms, I don't think any of us are in a position to point fingers about the cruelty of where these guys' food came from.* That rat probably had it better than the chicken I ate for lunch today.

*(Resident forum vegans and vegetarians excepted, of course.)