Ministry of Primary Industries v Harlow [2019] NZDC 5080 (20 March 2019)

Last Updated: 26 August 2019

EDITORIAL NOTE: CHANGES MADE TO THIS JUDGMENT APPEAR IN [SQUARE BRACKETS]

IN THE DISTRICT COURT AT KAIKOHE I TE KŌTI-Ā-ROHE KI KAIKOHE

CRI-2018-027-001560

[2019] NZDC 5080

MINISTRY OF PRIMARY INDUSTRIES

Prosecutor v

WARREN IAN HARLOW Defendant

Hearing:	20 March 2019
Appearances:	A Wood for the Prosecutor N Moore for the Defendant
Judgment:	20 March 2019

NOTES OF JUDGE D J ORCHARD ON SENTENCING

[1] Warren Ian Harlow, you are appearing today for sentence on four charges which were laid under the Animal Welfare Act 1999.

[2] The situation is that, or at least the circumstances of your offending are that you are a farmer in a relatively small way and you essentially run bulls on your property which you keep for the purpose of renting them out to the dairy industry to service their dairy cows.

[3] Now you came to the attention of the Ministry of Primary Industries in June or July of 2018 when somebody reported that they were concerned about the condition of your stock or at least large numbers of your stock.

NEW ZEALAND POLICE v WARREN IAN HARLOW [2019] NZDC 5080 [20 March 2019]

[4] One of the animal welfare inspectors, or at least one or more of the animal welfare inspectors employed by the Ministry, attended at your property on 4 July 2018 with a veterinarian and they carried out an inspection of your farm in Moerewa.

[5] They found that there were approximately 250 to 300 bulls on the farm and they found that on inspection about two-thirds of the stock were in poor body condition, with a third in acceptable body condition but they found that 20 animals from different mobs, so in other words 20 animals from the total stock numbers were emaciated to the point that it was obviously the result of a relatively long period of malnutrition.

[6] I am informed that they would have taken two to three months to get into that condition and I will take the lower estimate in fairness to you. So they must have been suffering or not properly fed for about two months prior to the visit by the inspectors and the vet.

[7] They also noted that there were eight dead bulls located on the property. One appeared to have died in a water dam because it had wandered into it and was too weak to get out, while seven of them had died after becoming trapped inside a fenced area of pine trees. Some of those animals, they determined, had died quite recently but three others were much more decomposed which means that they had got themselves lost in there and not been recovered by you some period before.

[8] They also found that there were a number of animals who were not getting sufficient water and more of that later, and in addition to that they found one of the bulls had a broken leg and should have been put down, it was in pain, but that had not been done.

[9] In those circumstances, the malnutrition, the lack of water and the bull with the broken leg were the matters which led to you being charged.

[10] You were asked to explain what had happened and you said that in relation to the dead bulls, you said that you had not known that in fact they were there and you blamed pig hunters for leaving the gate open into the pine block where they were found

and said that they must have been unable to find their way out after running out of whatever feed was available there, but however that maybe it does show that at this period of time you were not keeping a proper eye on your stock because part of your responsibilities to your stock would be to make sure you knew where they were and if they had got themselves into harm’s way, to rescue them from it.

[11] You also explained that what had happened with the bull with the broken leg, was that you were aware that its leg had been fractured and you had been trying to corner it to shoot it, but that you had been attacked by a bull sometime in the past and that made you fearful and so essentially one way and another you were wary of it. So that and a combination of I think when you had come across the beast, you would not have your gun and it would have hightailed by the time you got back with it, so one way or another you simply had not got around to it.

[12] In relation to the water, your explanation is that you think that was a temporary thing and it really happened overnight as a result of a pipe becoming disconnected and you anticipated that you would have seen that on the day of the inspection and corrected it.

[13] You also said that overarching all of this, you had really been under considerable stress in the times leading up to the inspection.

[14] Your [relative] who lived in Whangarei, so some distance from where your farm was, had been unwell and that she really needed to go into assisted care but was not prepared to do so and that had meant that you, who was really the only person responsible for her, had had to attend on her in Whangarei very frequently to the detriment of the farm.

[15] In addition to that, you explained that normally your farm would not be so heavily stocked but that particular year your bulls had not been in such high demand and so whereas ordinarily about 70 of them would have been off the property at that time, they were not which of course led to there being less feed available for each of them.

[16] You also mentioned that you had in the past tried to get someone to give you a hand but they had been unwilling, and really what you are saying is you had no one to turn to. So you were trying to soldier on and do the best you could in the circumstances and basically you dropped the ball.

[17] Now, your counsel has emphasised many of the points that you made to the inspectors. In addition, what she said too is that she, after speaking to you, is concerned that you may have some mental health problems, if I could put it that way. By that I do not mean you have got necessarily serious mental health problems but you are quite isolated and she is concerned that has an impact on you.

[18] She has suggested and I think that it is a very useful suggestion, that you join an organisation like Federated Farmers, and apparently you do not belong to any such organisation. I do not know much about them but one would hope that they would be in a position to give you advice and hopefully practical assistance if you find yourself in similar circumstances again.

[19] I note also that you have never appeared or you have never come to the attention of the Ministry before, and as I have said it seems that you have come to the attention of the Ministry this time because you have been in unusual circumstances and you are a man who seems to lack any real support in the community and I take those matters into account.

[20] The other thing that I take into account is that the Ministry acknowledges that as soon as they brought the situation to your attention, you took steps to deal with the problems. You immediately sold off more of your stock than in fact they suggested you sold off in order to reduce the numbers and the consequent stress on the land, you brought in feed, not just feed but you brought in a more expensive kind of feed to make sure that you build up the animals quickly, you immediately set about destroying the beast which had the broken leg and altogether you have done the best you can to rectify the situation.

[21] Those are matters which I intend to give considerable weight, and in particular I am persuaded that a lot of your problems perhaps or at least a lot of the reasons for

this situation arising, was your isolation and the stresses that you had upon you and that not just the stress of your [relative]’s difficulty but perhaps your own problems may have made you temporarily a little blind to the stresses on the animals.

[22] Now, it has been suggested by the Ministry that the lower starting point that would be appropriate is $10,000 and your counsel takes no issue with that.

[23] Obviously, I am afraid fines that are imposed in relation to serious neglect or ill treatment of animals and whatever the reason for it, that is what we have got here, have to reflect the seriousness of the charges and in particular have to bring home to people that if they are in charge of animals and responsible for their wellbeing, they must make sure that those animals do not suffer and clearly, I am afraid, some of your beasts suffered and they suffered greatly. However, I will take the starting point of

$10,000.

[24] In addition to that I take into account the difficulties that you were laboring under at this particular time as I have already described, I will take into account the fact that you have never before come to the attention of the Ministry, I appreciate that you have only been farming on your own account for a relatively short time but on the other hand you have been farming, I assume, for others during that period of time. I take into account that immediately the shortcomings were brought to your attention, you rectified them and took even greater steps towards doing that than were requested by the Ministry. I also take into account your early pleas of guilty.

[25] I am prepared to reduce the starting point by 25 percent for the matters of mitigation I have mentioned but do not include your early guilty pleas and by another 25 percent for your early pleas of guilty.

[26] I propose to deal with or structure that sentence by simply attaching all of it to one charging document and simply convicting you and discharging you on the others.

[27] So in relation to the charging document ending 1560, you are convicted, you are fined $5000.

[28] You are also ordered to pay Court costs of $130 and veterinarian’s fees of

$1108.20. You can pay that by instalments, the amount of the instalments will be determined by the registrar.

[29] In relation to the other matters as I say, you are simply convicted and discharged.

D J Orchard District Court Judge