A 15-second video of a cat tied to and dragged by a motorcycle recently went viral in Indonesia. As reported by Detik, the vile act took place on Sunday afternoon in the Wiradesa Sub-district of Pekalongan Regency in Central Java.
The video was taken by Diefie Hafiez Maufalia, a resident of Wiradesa Sub-district. She was angered to see the cruelty, but hesitated to call out the two men on the motorcycle because she was afraid they would end up in a fight. So she decided to record a video instead.
“I saw them at a road in Babel Village, Wonokerto Sub-district going in the direction of [Wonokerto] beach, at around 11:30 am. The passenger behind was the one who pulled the cat, but I wasn’t sure if the cat was still alive or not,” Diefie said, as quoted in an article published by Detik yesterday.
Wiradesa Police tracked down the suspects using the motorcycle’s license plate and today arrested one of them, a 29-year-old identified by his initials ML.
“We came to his house, we asked him and his family [regarding the incident],” Wiradesa Police Chief Yoris Prabowo said today, as quoted by Detik.
Police say ML and the other alleged culprit beat the cat — which appears to have been a stray — until it stopped moving. Afterwards, they tied a rope around the cat’s neck and dragged it on the motorcycle.
ML said he “heard voices” that told him to torture the cat, which he said was supposedly evil.
Police are still on the hunt for the other suspect, who drove the motorcycle. According to Yoris, the only person who knows his identity and whereabouts is ML, but, based on the answers he has given authorities, the police say it’s likely they can’t take ML’s confession at face value as they suspect he has some sort of mental disability.
“We brought ML to a Pekalongan hospital along with his family to check on his mental health, because he kept changing his explanations during the inspection,” Yoris said.
The police did not say whether or not the cat survived being pulled by the motorcycle, even though it appears very unlikely.
Indonesia has laws to prevent animal cruelty, but activists say a lack of awareness and will to enforce those laws have seen many animal cruelty cases ignored by law enforcement.
Also read: Abandoned: Indonesia’s animal activists lack legal backing to stop cruelty towards critters
Reader Interactions