JAILED: Walsall bird torturer given six months custody
A man who appeared to enjoy terrorising a flock of birds that had been stolen has been locked up for six months.
Chad Worgan was part of a gang captured on CCTV who carried out the 'sadistic crime' in the early hours of January 12 with the bulging bags and boxes containing 200 birds belonging to a lifelong collector.
Worgan, aged 19, of Dolphin House, Goscote, Walsall was said to have a grin on his face as he kicked and squeezed the birds before heading into a flat.
At Walsall Magistrates Court yesterday, chairman of the bench Mr Bob Thomas, said: "This was a particularly serious, cruel, nasty, sadistic crime which you appeared to enjoy from looking at the CCTV footage.
"In your interviews with the probation service you were reluctant to accept responsibility for this crime. Furthermore, you were still serving a rehabilitation order."
Worgan admitted an offence of receiving stolen goods during a trial last month and an offence of causing unnecessary suffering to a protected animal on the basis that he kicked a pigeon.
His plea was rejected however by magistrates who found him guilty of causing unnecessary suffering to the birds.
Mr Sarbjit Lally, defending, said Worgan had admitted he had played a role in the act of animal cruelty.
Alongside three others including Jake Higgs, 23, of Margam Crescent, Mossley, Thomas Knox, 19, of Mulberry Road, Dudley Fields, Bloxwich and a 16-year-old boy who cannot be named for legal reasons, they tortured the birds before posting them through letterboxes and dropping them though people's windows.
The birds valued at £1,500 in total were stolen from Lee Williams' aviary in Brownhills. They were bundled into sacks and containers, with only one finch left alive and another dead at the property in Bridge Street, Clayhanger.
Mr Williams, a rare bird breeder, had spent his whole life collecting the rare jays, finches, budgerigars, doves, quails and pigeons.
The foursome was arrested after the unfolding incident was spotted on CCTV. Then a resident with learning difficulties reported that a dead bird had been posted through their letterbox – leading the police to link it to the earlier burglary.
For causing unnecessary suffering Worgan was jailed for six months, for handling stolen goods he was given six weeks to run concurrently and he was ordered to pay £350 compensation and an £80 victim surcharge.
The16-year-old was also sentenced yesterday and given an 18-month rehabilitation order.
Higgs and Knox will be sentenced on Wednesday.
