National Statistics

Sources: Pima County Attorney's Office, Humane Society of the United States
http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/living/...elty_side.html

*76 percent of animal cruelty offenses are committed by males (and of those, 90 percent involve intentional cruelty and dog fighting.)

*48 percent of rapists and 30 percent of child molesters committed acts of animal cruelty as children or adolescents.

*71 percent of abused women report that their batterers have threatened to hurt/kill their pets and have done so, while 32 percent of battered women with children report that their children have hurt or killed pets.

*80 percent of homes in which animal control agencies found abused/neglected pets there had been previous investigations by child welfare agencies of physical abuse and neglect.

*Most teen schoolyard shooters were abusing animals months or even years prior to their killing sprees on school campuses. Likewise, many serial killers including Jeffrey Dahmer, Theodore (Ted) Bundy, and Albert DeSalvo (Boston Strangler) abused, tortured or mutilated animals as youth.

*In 1997, the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and Northwestern University examined criminal records of 153 animal abusers and 153 nonabusers over a 20-year period. The study found that people who abuse animals are five times more likely to commit violent crimes than nonabusers.

*The first clear description and systematic study of children who commit animal cruelty was released in 1977. It established the typical animal abuser as being a male of average intelligence with an early history of antisocial behavior, with a childhood history that is likely to include gross neglect, brutality, rejection and hostility.

*According to Pima County Animal Control manager Rodrigo Silva's reports for last fiscal year, July 1, 2001 to June 30, 2002, the center received 2,812 complaints in the city and country regarding animal welfare, which includes animal neglect and misdemeanor animal abuse. Of those, 411 citations were issued and 699 dogs, 169 cats and 16 various other animals were impounded. The numbers are comparable to the previous two fiscal years.

*shakes head* It's a sad world we live in...

I guess there's one good thing that comes outta this though; People who don't care about animals will start to when they hear how it's connected to human abuse.

:( So sad, but I believe it.

so sad, I hate the way the world is today.

We were just talking about this in my Child Psych class...its very true that people who hurt animals also hurt children and sometimes thier wives. The first person to stop the abuse of children (way back in the "olden days") was a person in charge of stopping animal abuse...yes, animals were protected before children.

Also, animal control people are sworn Municiple Reporters (like teachers, doctors, etc.), this means that if they see anything that even remotely resembles abuse on a child they have to tell the police (or face jail time and fines). There is an established link between animal abusers and child abusers...I think its kind of good they are trained to keep an eye out for both.

It really is sickening...

so true, people who abuse tend to abuse all that they can.

This is horrible but unfortunately so true.

Sometimes it's not hard to see the truth in this quote:

We have enslaved the rest of the animal creation, and have treated our distant cousins in fur and feathers so badly that beyond doubt, if they were able to formulate a religion, they would depict the Devil in human form.

William Ralph Inge

God I hate the human race. That statistic is just one more reason I prefer my dogs' company over most humans.