Laurence Dollimore
A BRITISH pensioner has been left heartbroken after hunting dogs stormed into his house and savagely killed his ‘beautiful’ cat Gnocchi.
Former Army serviceman Clive, 59, was shocked out of sleep at 1.30am to find the two-year-old rescue lying in blood on the conservatory floor.
Worse, when he called the police he was told ‘it’s just a cat’ and there was ‘nothing’ they could do.
Incredibly, one officer told him that ‘if the dogs attack again’, he should lock them in his house and call the 112 emergency service and wait for them to arrive.
“I’m literally still shaking from the ordeal, it’s left me riddled with anxiety and stress,” explained Clive, who bought his three-bedroom villa in Altea, four years ago.
“The police attitude was disgusting… when they said it was ‘only a cat’ I replied: ‘what if it was a child or a vulnerable person?’
“The hunters here act with impunity and think they are above the law, it’s a disgrace, never in my life did I think something like this would happen to me.
“We are surrounded by beautiful forests which are supposed to be protected, but you often see hunters with huge dogs and torches coming in the dead of night.”
The horror incident happened in the early hours of December 4, when he woke up hearing several loud bangs coming from the conservatory on the upstairs terrace of the property he shares with his wife Shami, 50.
The couple leave the door ever so slightly ajar to allow air in, but put big weights against it which make it very difficult to open.
Their property is also surrounded by high walls and is ‘well-secured’.
Clive said as he approached the conservatory he saw two huge white dogs ‘jumping around’. The ‘wolf-like’ animals had burst through the door, damaging it in the process.
He recalled: “They were enormous, I’m 6ft and they were at least up to my hip. I grabbed a beach towel and whipped it towards them and shouted but that only made them come for me, I was scared for my life.
“I had to run behind a door while still shouting and trying to hit them with the towel and eventually they left.
“I walked to the other end of the conservatory where I saw our poor beautiful Gnocchi dead on the floor.”
Clive said the Guardia Civil arrived a few hours later to tell him there was nothing they could do as the dogs ‘had done nothing wrong’ in the eyes of the law.
It comes after Spain brought in tough new legislation on ‘animal welfare’ this year, but made no changes in regards to hunting dogs.
Holding back tears, Clive added: “They said the best we could do – if we found the owners – would be to sue for the damage done to the door.
“It seems to me that hunters here have a carte blanche right to do whatever they want, it has to change.”
The couple, who live between Alicante and York, buried Gnocchi in their back garden.
