In all, four investigations, all relating to acts of cruelty to horses, were opened. This Tuesday, the prosecution of Clermont-Ferrand and Amiens announced to have opened several preliminary investigations after the discovery of mysterious mutilations of horses, found dead in the Somme and Puy-de-Dôme, with a cut ear.
The public prosecutor's office of Amiens is seized with three facts which occurred in the spring: one at Quend Plage, on the coast, and two at Berny-en-Santerre, in Haute-Somme, concerning "horses or ponies" found dead with the ear. sectioned right. Three preliminary investigations were opened and "grouped under the authority of a single investigator to be able to study all possible comparisons", detailed the prosecutor of Amiens, Alexandre de Bosschère. Entrusted to the gendarmes of the Péronne research brigade, they target the crime of “acts of cruelty to an animal”.
" A challenge ? The drive of an individual? "
In Puy-de-Dôme, a preliminary investigation was also opened in the spring and entrusted to the gendarmes of Ancizes for two similar facts which took place six months apart between the end of 2018 and June 2019 in the same village. "But the owners did not file a complaint at first, before other cases were publicized in France," said the prosecutor of Clermont-Ferrand, Eric Maillaud.
Other cases have been identified elsewhere, notably in Aisne, Vendée, Moselle, Loire and Lot, according to him. "We are in contact with the other prosecution services to try to establish reconciliations and possibly group the investigations, but for the moment this is not the case," he added.
"A priori the ear was not shredded by another animal, the cuts seem to have been made by an instrument but we have no track, all of this remains a big mystery," said Eric Maillaud. "Is this a challenge launched on the Internet? A challenge ? The drive of an individual? All tracks are being considered, ”said Bruno Wallart, commander of the Riom gendarmerie company (Puy-de-Dôme).
For him, the only common point of these cases, it is "the death of these horses in a surprising way and the mutilation". "It questions. There is a strong sensitivity around the suffering of animals. We (justice) in any case, we give ourselves the means. We are treating this very seriously, just for the moment, we have no leads, ”said the Amiens prosecutor.
