Branded: Turbo the cat was shaved and marked with a swastika in a strange attack. (Picture: press.co.nz)

A cat has been the victim of a brutal and bizarre attack as its owners found his whiskers had been cut off, his body partly shaved and a swastika drawn on his back.

One-year-old Turbo returned to his home in Christchurch, New Zealand, after the cruel attack when his owners noticed something was not quite right.

Jess and James McGriffin were watching TV yesterday evening when Turbo jumped on her lap. She started petting him, realising that he had been shaved on his back, forehead, legs, and other patches on his body.

His whiskers were also missing.


To make the strange cat attack even worse, a Nazi symbol had been drawn into his shaved back with black marker pen.



‘It had obviously just happened. I just cried. It’s so horrible. I just couldn’t believe it,’ the devastated mum told the Press in New Zealand.

Jess McGriffin holds Turbo and strokes his bald patch. (Picture: press.co.nz)

At first she though it could have been a racist attack against her Filipino husband, but Ms McGriffin has since ruled that out and now thinks children could have been involved in a cruel joke.

‘I honestly don’t know who would be behind it. I’ve lived in Burnside pretty much my whole life and we’ve been in this house for three years. There’s been nothing like this, ever. I just reckon it’s some silly teenagers.’ she added.

‘The scariest bit is they took my cat off the street, took him somewhere [and] held him down.

‘When he was two months old he got stuck in a fence and we had to remove his tail. Now he is tail-less, whisker-less and has shaved spots.’

Shaving would be an offence under the New Zealand Animal Welfare Act if it caused distress or pain. The McGriffins reported the incident to the police and animal protection group, SPCA.

Little Turbo is currently being kept indoors until his whiskers grow back.