Oxfordshire woman jailed for drowning eight cats Published duration 29 October 2010

image caption Julie Carter claimed she could not afford the phone call to have the animals rescued

An Oxfordshire woman who admitted drowning eight cats in a bath has been jailed for 12 weeks.

Julie Carter, 43, of Bicester, told RSPCA staff she could not afford a phone call to have the cats rescued so killed them one by one over a week.

The cats were all aged between one and three years old. Another three were later rehomed.

Carter told Banbury magistrates she had killed the cats because housing officials had told her to remove them.

The RSPCA said that when an inspector later visited her property, she had initially lied, saying the animals had been put to sleep by a vet.

'No choice'

She later confessed, saying she had not had enough money to contact any animal charities, and had drowned the pets in a baby bath instead.

She told the inspector "she felt she did not have any other choice," the RSPCA said.

Carter, of Herald Way, who had admitted a charge of causing unnecessary suffering at an earlier hearing, was also banned from keeping animals for life.

Speaking after the case, RSPCA inspector Doug Davidson said: "The callous and brutal drowning of her eight pet cats is not acceptable in the 21st Century.