Recently the Wellington Egg Company, run by scumbag Chin and his wife, was prosecuted for animal cruelty and closed down. Good on the Wellington SPCA for a successful prosecution.

Reading between the lines at the judge's comments, it appears as if the judge wished he could have given them a jail term but was constrained by the law into having to give community service instead. However, Chin was also make to pay a substantial fine and banned from keeping birds for 10 years, so the main objective, that of closing down the factory, was achieved.

This is the first time a factory farm has been successfully prosecuted so it creates an important legal precedent. Given that Chin's factory farm was actually no worse than any other battery cage hellhole, it is a perfect opportunity for activists to make formal complaints under the Animal Welfare Act to other SPCAs, so that we can close them all down.

It is important however that complaints are made at the right time. I earlier made a complaint to Wellington SPCA about Wellington Egg farm, and they made an unannounced inspection, only to report that they could find no breaches. the reason was because the new hens had only just been put into the cages, so were not yet showing symptoms of their physical and psychological torture.

It was a worker at Chin's factory who later dobbed the scumbags in to the SPCA, and this time it was done when signs of suffering were more obvious.

Phil