Pevensey farmer banned from keeping pigs after starving animals (From The Argus)

Pevensey farmer banned from keeping pigs after starving animals

7:43am Thursday 30th September 2010 in News

A farmer who let his pigs go so hungry they turned to cannibalism has been banned from keeping animals.

Keith Barnett, owner of the Happy Pig Company, based in Pevensey pleaded guilty to seven charges of animal cruelty earlier this month.

Yesterday, Hastings Magistrates’ Court fined ordered him to pay £880 costs and banned him from keeping pigs.

The court also imposed a five-month curfew on him between 7pm and 7am, which would be electrically monitored.

Barnett, 60, of The Square, Pevensey Bay, admitted not providing enough food, water and shelter for the animals on the farm he ran at Normans Bay, Pevensey.

Dead pigs were left in the field with the live ones, which fed on the carcasses.

Magistrates allowed Barnett to keep his 12 chickens as there had been no deliberate act of cruelty.

The farm was raided in January by Animal Health Agency and Trading Standards inspectors.

Gareth Jones, from East Sussex County Council, said a number of the pigs were very clearly underweight and had been left to starve.