Andrew Kevin James Skidmore, pictured in 2025, pleaded guilty to animal cruelty offences. Photo: Albert McKnight.
A driver who filmed himself swerving across the road in order to run over two kangaroos did get some sense of enjoyment from his actions, a court has heard.
Andrew Kevin James Skidmore, 24, admitted killing two kangaroos in separate incidents on the Kings Highway at Kowen on 18 and 22 April 2024.
Two videos he filmed with a mobile phone from inside a 4WD were played to the ACT Magistrates Court, both showing the car travelling along the road at night before swerving and hitting kangaroos.
In the second video, he swerved onto the grass beside the road, ran over a kangaroo then yelled, “Woo”.
On Friday (9 January), he was sentenced to a total of 15-months’ jail, fully suspended for a four-year good behaviour order. He was also handed a $3000 fine, 250 hours of community service and disqualified from driving for 12 months.
“Your actions were callous, inhumane and cruel towards those animals,” Magistrate Amy Begley told him.
“You went out of your way to harm them.
“In my view, that was cowardly and targeted towards innocent animals.”
The prosecutor argued it was clear from the videos that Skidmore made a positive decision to run over and kill the kangaroos, as well as that he obtained some sort of satisfaction or even enjoyment from the act.
Magistrate Begley agreed that saying “Woo”, indicated Skidmore did get some sense of enjoyment from his actions.
Andrew Kevin James Skidmore was handed a 15-month fully-suspended sentence. Photo: Albert McKnight.
The prosecutor also said, according to a pre-sentence report, he sought to minimise his offending by referring to when he had previously gone hunting kangaroos and saying he didn’t know it was illegal to kill them.
Skidmore told the court he had to represent himself as he had been unable to find a lawyer.
He said he now understood it was illegal to kill kangaroos, but he then referred to the number of kangaroos the ACT Government killed in its annual cull.
“You also understand the legal culling of kangaroos is not done in the manner in which you killed these kangaroos?” Magistrate Begley said to him.
Skidmore claimed another person hit him with a vehicle on 17 April 2024 and he suffered a concussion and broken nose.
“I was in pain at the time and wasn’t in a very good head space at all,” he said.
He said he used to live in the NSW town of Bungendore but now lived in Canberra where he worked as a landscaper.
Skidmore, whose case first appeared in the courts last year, pleaded guilty to two counts each of aggravated cruelty to an animal, dangerous driving and using a mobile phone while driving.
“It is difficult to comprehend that the person would act so cruelly towards the defenceless kangaroo, but filming themselves doing it then and posting it, as if it’s something to be proud of, is beyond the pale,” RSPCA ACT CEO Michelle Robertson said after the sentencing.
“Whether a companion animal or wildlife, no animal should ever be treated in this manner.”
Just minutes after Magistrate Begley told him she had come close to sending him to jail when handing down her sentence, he told this journalist outside the courtroom, “Do you want to go?”
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