The woman was sentenced to a 20-month good behaviour order and banned from owning pets for three years. Photo: Albert McKnight.
While a woman was banned from owning pets for three years when she was sentenced for stomping on her dog, a court heard she has already suffered “online abuse” due to her crime.
The woman, who is legally no longer able to be named, was found guilty of a charge of cruelty to an animal at an ACT Magistrates Court hearing earlier this month.
In January 2025, her pitbull bit her on her arm, so she threw it through the air to shake it off.
A neighbour heard barks or whelps before seeing the 23 kg dog flailing through the air, and he began recording a video.
The video showed her moving towards the dog on her balcony, then stomping on it.
“Don’t f-ing do that to me,” she told the dog.
“That’s what you get, you f-ing piece of s-t.”
When finding the woman guilty, Magistrate Alexandra Burt said she was not satisfied the act of throwing the dog was cruel as the woman had just been bitten on the arm.
But she said the stomping was likely to have caused the dog pain or stress and said this had been cruel.
Before the woman’s sentencing on Tuesday (23 September), her lawyer, Legal Aid’s Gillian Bilton, applied for the court to be closed, which would have prevented media reporting on the proceedings.
She claimed that after media articles were published about her client being found guilty, her client had faced threats to her safety. She also argued this amounted to extra-curial punishment.
“She has been the target of online abuse,” Ms Bilton claimed.
She claimed the woman had been contacted online by strangers threatening to go to her home and inflict violence on her, and the woman’s details had been published online.
“What’s your address? I’m coming over to do the same thing that you did to the pitbull,” she said one person sent her client.
Comments allegedly sent to the woman over the social media website Facebook were tendered to the court, as were screenshots of a post on an anti-animal abuse Facebook page.
The sentencing was delayed for the woman to report the alleged threats to police.
“[The woman] should not be subject to threats or violence that are targeted at her,” Magistrate Burt said.
She noted the comments generally expressed disapproval for the woman’s conduct.
“It does appear that some of that conduct has become threatening,” she said.
Magistrate Burt refused to close the court, but thought there should be some restriction on what the media could publish and made a non-publication order over the woman’s name.
The court went on to hear that the woman had previously expressed care and love for the dog and was saddened as it had been removed from her care.
Magistrate Burt told the woman the force she used on the dog was significant and the video had captured her pet making a ‘whelp’ when she stomped on it.
She said the dog had shown some aggression to the woman earlier, but that didn’t justify her response.
“Animals are obviously vulnerable in the sense that they are dependent on their human carers for all their needs,” she said.
The woman was sentenced to a 20-month good behaviour order and banned from owning animals for three years, although an exception was made to allow her to keep her 12 fish.
Thank you the interview and for taking our concerns directly to the CIT Executive! ~* Lisa View