A pet owner who killed his cat by slitting her throat with a razor blade to hide the fact he had broken her leg has been jailed for six months.
Adam Alkour, 32, cut the neck of six-year-old black and white moggy Darwin at his home before letting her bleed out in the bathroom.
He later text a friend saying: “I killed my cat. Bad craic. Feeling f**king unholy as f**k.”
A court heard Alkour had broken the cat’s leg after losing his temper and decided to kill her two days later because a vet might notice he had caused the injury.
He then walked six miles to bury the body before confessing to a friend what he had done.
The RSPCA were alerted to the death of the cat , which had been in Alkour’s care for around seven months, in January.
Inspector Kirsty Keogh-Laws then uncovered a series of damning text messages which revealed Alkour had killed Darwin by cutting her throat.
He had found a razor in the bathroom and secured the cat in a towel before inflicting her with a ‘deliberate injury intending to kill her’ and watching her bleed to death.
Alkour, of Heaton, Newcastle upon Tyne, went on to admit three animal cruelty charges at Newcastle Magistrates Court.
He admitted causing unnecessary suffering, failing to provide veterinary care for the broken leg and failing to protect her from pain, suffering, injury or disease.
Alkour was jailed for six months and banned from keeping animals for life at Newcastle Crown Court on Monday (14/11).
Sentencing, Recorder Mark McKone KC said: “People who are cruel to animals in a serious way will see a prison sentence.”
After the case, RSPCA Inspector Keogh-Laws said: “When I first visited Alkour he stated he had killed the cat a couple of months ago.
“He said he had a psychotic break when he killed Darwin. He told me he had walked six miles to bury the cat after the incident.
“He also told me he deliberately took a razor to Darwin’s throat. The pain caused by this act is obvious to any reasonable owner.
“The RSPCA received a series of text messages in which Alkour describes ‘breaking her arm’ and being unable to get a vet appointment for two days suggesting the period Darwin was in pain and did not see a vet was substantial.
“Mr Alkour told me in the interview that he subjected Darwin to ‘an afternoon and evening of violence’.
“This would only serve to hugely increase the stress and fear Darwin had in her daily life and Mr Alkour by his own admission had already stated Darwin was terrified of him.”
In other text messages, Alkour wrote: “I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown and then I finally totally broke and totally raged and ended up hitting her so hard I broke her arm and I f**king freaked the f**k out after not being able to get a vet appointment until another 2 days after and I took her life out of pure cowardness that they would know I hurt her.
“After I came back down to earth I walked 6 f**king miles to go bury her and then went back the next day to do it better because the ground was so frozen.”
A vet report into Darwin’s death concluded that the wound would have caused ‘extreme pain and trauma.’
It added: “Depending on how quickly and deeply this cut was performed the period of suffering may have been many minutes.”
A second vet report concluded: “The period of suffering may have been short if the severance of the blood vessels was achieved to the level of a person trained in methods of slaughter equipped with a sharp knife.
“It is more probable that a lay person performing this act with the intent to cause fatal harm in a domestic setting, to a fully conscious cat, would have been lengthy.
“During the time it took to reach a level of unconsciousness the pain and trauma would have been intense with suffering.
“This suffering and the death of Darwin the cat was both avoidable and unnecessary had Alkour relinquished the care of the cat when they were no longer able to meet her needs.
“The owner had the awareness of a veterinary practice that had been previously attended which would have been an initial location to seek help.
“The irreversible fatal harm caused to Darwin the cat whose immense suffering could not be reversed removed the opportunity of her being restored to a kind and caring home environment where her needs could have been successfully met.”
In mitigation, Alkour said that Darwin was ‘dumped’ on him and that he was suffering with his mental health and struggling to care for himself.
He also claimed that he unsuccessfully tried to rehome Darwin.
