Notorious cat torturer arrested in Tai Po

The reign of terror on Tai Po's feline population has ended with the arrest on Sunday of a 24-year-old man believed to be behind the abuse and torture of cats in an otherwise quiet neighborhood.

Police arrested the suspect, surnamed Lee, after a review of a surveillance camera showed that he tortured a cat at the back of a bicycle repair shop on Kwong Fuk Road around midnight last Friday, Apple Daily reports.

Lee will also be charged with illegal possession of weapons after two military knives, each measuring 22.5cm in length, were found in his backpack.

A video footage from the bicycle shop's CCTV camera shows the suspect, who is wearing gloves, putting a cat inside a carton box and tying a nylon cord around its neck.

He then throws the box to the canvas awning of the bicycle shop and pulls the string attached to the cat's neck to force it to plunge to the ground, according to news website hk01.com.

He does this several times.

The video clip also shows him beaming strong lights into the eyes of the cat, which later managed to escape amid the chaos.

The shop owner, surnamed Chan, said he does not know the suspect.

But Chan recalled a few instances in recent months when the back of his shop was vandalized, with cat’s food scattered around the floor.

He suspected that the suspect used the food as bait for his intended victims.

Chan also said he had heard from several pet care volunteers that Lee could be linked to many other animal abuse cases involving around 200 cats in the past 12 months.

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