Birkenhead father and son jailed for animal cruelty
A man has been jailed for "stomach-churning" animal cruelty offences, including forcing animals to fight each other and filming it.
Lee Guy, 42, from Birkenhead admitted feeding pigeons to ferrets, setting three dogs on a fox and inhumanely slaughtering three chickens.
He was sentenced to 22 weeks in jail at Wirral Magistrates' Court.
His father Ronald Guy, 63, also of Birkenhead, was sentenced to 12 weeks in prison for killing chickens.
The pair, both of Harrowby Road, were banned for life from owning any animals and Guy Jnr's dog and puppies were seized.
They were both ordered to pay £300 costs.
RSPCA officer Anthony Joynes said after sentencing it was the worst case of animal cruelty he had ever seen.
He said footage taken by Lee which was shown to the court demonstrated "graphic animal torture" and "animal-baiting".
Mr Joynes said: "I had to watch this footage for hours and hours and it was stomach-churning and just pure torture of defenceless animals."
He said the fights were staged for "entertainment and fun" and that Guy Jnr appeared to have an "obsession with the interaction of predator and prey".
At an earlier hearing he admitted the inhumane slaughter of three chickens with a blunt and rusty blade between 1 January 2011 and 30 March 2012.
He also admitted three counts of causing unnecessary suffering to wild rats by causing them to be attacked by dogs.