Free Republic

A six-legged calf has defied the odds by thriving despite a vet's prediction at birth that it would not survive. Seven-week-old Lilli is a minor celebrity in her native Switzerland after local media were splashed with images of the calf frolicking in a sunny field. Farmer Andreas Knutti from Weissenburg, 19 miles south of the capital, Bern, says he couldn't bring himself to euthanise the animal because she was "so full of life".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=OCbuRA_D3KU If this doesn't crack you up, your humor bone is broken. They never should have cancelled The Muppet Show

Some virtues are by accidents of history associated with utopianism, hostility to private property, anti-clericalism, and other core beliefs of the Left. I can scandalize a yoga instructor anywhere in the world by declaring myself an avid admirer of Margaret Thatcher, though I challenge you to read the yoga sutras and conclude from them that devotees must favor an overregulated financial sector. Concern for the welfare and dignity of animals is such an issue, associated with nihilist leftists such as Peter Singer and local totalitarians who seek to regulate pets out of existence. But one need not believe that animals...

The 20 most famous vegetarians of all-time will appear on a series of postage stamps — and the folks at PETA are hoping it’s a good way to lick animal abuse. In time for the holiday-card rush, the stamps featuring such meatless celebs as Paul McCartney, Ellen DeGeneres, and Morrissey will be released Tuesday. “These are very influential people, and not everyone knows that these folks are vegetarian,” said Lisa Lange, vice president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. The stamps will also feature hip-hop impresario Russell Simmons, actors Woody Harrelson and Natalie Portman, and singers Chrissie Hynde,...

If I had tried to get this same image by trying to pose the animals, it never would have happened. The best pictures of livestock and pets come from the moment. Animals have emotions, but they do not provide them on a command. Looking at Rita's face, the strength and love of this animal shows.

As California attempts to divorce itself from fossil-fueled electricity, it may be trading one environmental sin for another -- although you don't hear state officials admitting it. Wind power is the fastest growing component in the state's green energy portfolio, but wildlife advocates say the marriage has an unintended consequence: dead birds, including protected species of eagles, hawks and owls. Wind Turbines on a wind farm in the Mojave Desert in South California. "The cumulative impacts are huge," said Shawn Smallwood, one of the few recognized experts studying the impact of wind farms on migratory birds. "It is not inconceivable...

FRANKFORT, Maine — The mother of a 7-month-old girl mauled to death by the family dog in April was arrested Wednesday night and charged in connection with the death. Maine State Police Detective Adam Kelley arrested 29-year-old Katrina Mitchell at her home on Town Hill Road and charged her with endangering the welfare of a child. Mitchell was taken to Waldo County Jail and was being held in lieu of $1,060 bail. The charge was filed after police consulted with the District Attorney’s Office. Annabelle Mitchell was mauled to death on April 12 in the living room of her house...

A unique and mysterious guinea-pig-sized rodent, not seen since 1898 despite several organized searches, bizarrely showed up at the front door of an ecolodge at a nature reserve in Colombia, South America. The magnificent red-crested tree rat (Santamartamys rufodorsalis), stayed for almost two hours while two research volunteers took the first photos ever of a creature the world thought would never be seen again. The charming nocturnal rodent made his re-debut to the world at 9:30PM on May 4, 2011 at the El Dorado Nature Reserve in the far north of the country. The Reserve was established in 2005 by...

In 2007, when Dominique Strauss-Kahn was packing up to become the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, Jean Quatremer, a writer for the French paper Libération wrote on his blog that "Strauss-Kahn's only real problem is his relationship to women. Too heavy … it borderlines harassment," reports the UK’s Guardian. The Guardian says that “many politicians privately wonder[ed]” then “how he would cope in a puritan U.S. which frowns upon sexual advances.”He may not have coped at all. He may have snapped. I hope that I’m wrong about it, but fear that I’m not. Strauss-Khan, a 62-year old French...

The Facebook message was brief and chilling - ‘Bout 2 kill ma kid’. It was posted by 24-year-old Australian Ramazan ‘Ramzy’ Acar before he plunged a huge Ninja-style knife into the body of his two-year-old daughter Yazmina. As the girl lay dying, Acar posted another message, directed at the child’s mother, Rachelle D’Argent: ‘It’s ova - I did it.' Then he posted another vengeful Facebook message to Miss D’Argent, from whom he was separated, reading: ‘Pay back, u slut.’ Sickening details of the murder of Yazmina were revealed in the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court today as Acar - wearing an oversize...

A 55 feet long fish has been found in the seashore of Guangdong, China. According to a local newspaper, the big fish weighs at least 10,000 pounds. Hwang, a 66-years-old fisherman living in the near area, said he has never seen anything like this in his whole life and that the fish was tied with ropes when it was first found. Many people have flocked to see this strange specimen since its discovery, although its rotting corpse already emits a foul smell. The people living in the area think the fish was caught by some fisherman but was abandoned due...

I was very surprised one year ago on April 20, 2010 with the Supreme Court ruling in United States v. Stevens and that the decision came down with such an overwhelming 8 to 1 majority. But the unpredictable Supreme Court left only Judge Samuel Alito arguing that Congress's ban on the distribution of animal cruelty videos should not be voided under the First Amendment's protection of the freedom of speech. Justice Alito wrote: "The Court’s approach, which has the practical effect of legalizing the sale of such [animal cruelty] videos and is thus likely to spur a resumption of their...

Jury in the Chauncey Bailey murder trial could see the hourlong clip as soon as Wednesday. OAKLAND -- Large portions of a secretly recorded police video on which former Your Black Muslim leader Yusuf Bey IV laughed about the 2007 killing of journalist Chauncey Bailey, threatened to kill a police officer and implicated himself in a kidnapping and torture case can be shown to jurors, a judge ruled Tuesday. The jury in Bey IV and co-defendant Antoine Mackey's triple murder trial could see the video as early as Wednesday, after other witnesses testify in the case. Judge Thomas Reardon, working...

Working with a rescue organization brings a lot of joy and occasional heartbreak. Please pray for my cat Wilby. He is a very special guy. A little less than a year ago, a retired nun found his mother under her porch with a new litter. At first, it seemed like none of the kittens had survived. Wilby was still in his birth sac and was about to be buried when he began to move. He was sent to our organization with his mother where he was eventally weaned and fostered. Last evening, he became very ill. It is not known...

Goose Has No Mate, Deer May Be Protecting Nest BUFFALO, N.Y. -- An unusual springtime friendship between a deer and a nesting goose appears to have blossomed inside a cemetery in Buffalo, N.Y. For the past week or so, the deer has been standing near an urn where the goose has taken up residence, positioning itself between the urn and any passing car or foot traffic. Craig Cygan noticed the unlikely pair during his regular patrols with his goose-chasing border collies. He says there is no mate around the goose and he believes the deer has taken over the job...

CORSICANA, Texas – A rejected suitor is accused of abducting a woman at gunpoint, then shackling and assaulting her at his Texas home for nearly two weeks. Jeffrey Allan Maxwell has been charged with aggravated kidnapping and aggravated sexual assault in the 13-day ordeal. Parker County Sheriff Larry Fowler said Monday the 62-year-old woman was abducted from her home March 1.

Shirley Lynette Ledford was a pretty, 16-year-old teenage girl just coming into her own in 1979, the year she was kidnapped and murdered. She would have turned 48 this year. I got to thinking about her Wednesday after reading another story about how we can't seem to come up with a humane way to thin out the waiting list on San Quentin's death row without causing murderers too much pain and suffering. It's a hard argument to swallow when you know the pain and suffering Ledford went through at the end of her short life. I can still hear her...

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — They’re calling it the parcel puppy. A Minneapolis woman is charged with animal cruelty after police say she tried to send a puppy through the mail. The poodle-mixed pup is being held temporarily at the animal control office in Minneapolis but still belongs to the woman who allegedly tried to mail it — 39-year-old Stacey Champion. “Clearly there wasn’t a whole lot of thought that went into this,” said Sgt. Angela Dodge with the Minneapolis Police Department. Dodge said last Tuesday Champion took the puppy to the Loring Post Office. The puppy was in a box with...

US appeals judges Tuesday began considering whether a 13-year-old boy accused of murder could be tried as an adult -- and risk spending the rest of his life behind bars. The Pennsylvania Superior Court was considering a case that has attracted international scrutiny because of the possibility that Jordan Brown, who was just 11 at the time of his alleged crime, might be imprisoned as an adult and never be released. The three-judge panel queried lawyers about the decision by a lower court to bar Brown from being sent to a juvenile court. A key requirement of the juvenile court...

I'm starting this thread as a central repository for animal die-off reports. Initial posting date is Jan. 21, 2011. I encourage anyone and everyone to post additional reports to this thread.

You'd almost think this little dog had a built-in GPS. A shaggy-haired Shih Tzu named Prince - missing for five years - has found his way home even though his owner moved four times since he disappeared. Myrna Carrillo got the cute pooch when he was just a puppy, and had him for three years before he went missing from her mother's house in Delano, Calif., NBC News reports. "It was sad you know, because I was really attached to him," Carillo said. Carillo got married, had two children and moved four times in the five years that Prince was...

People on the north coast of Labrador say scores of dead seals have been washing ashore since early December. A conservation officer with the area's Inuit government estimated late last week that hundreds of adult and young seals have died in the area between Hopedale and Makkovik this winter. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) is testing the carcasses, but Nunatsiavut conservation officer Ian Winters said many people in the area believe DFO hasn't acted quickly enough. "I think they should have been up here earlier, if you're asking me. A lot of people said the same thing. So,...

SALT LAKE CITY -- A federal jury found a rambling street preacher guilty Friday of the 2002 kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart in a case that has tugged at hearts around the nation ever since the Utah teenager was snatched from her bedroom and resurfaced nine months later.

The wild-eyed Long Island man who stabbed an 8-year-old boy playing video games has a history of mental illness and had planned the attack, prosecutors said. Evan Sachs, 23, was allegedly carrying a note saying he was committed to hurting a child when he walked into a Dave & Buster's in Westbury Friday night and plunged a knife into the boy's back five times.

TINKER with the genetics of salmon and maybe you create a revolutionary new food source that could help the environment and feed the hungry. Or maybe you're creating what some say is an untested "frankenfish" that could cause unknown allergic reactions and the eventual decimation of the wild salmon population. The US Food and Drug Administration hears both arguments this week when it begins a two-day meeting on whether to approve the marketing of the genetically engineered fish, which would be the first such animal approved for human consumption. The agency has already said the salmon, which grows twice...

All cats may have nine lives, but Christopher, an orange and white tabby who lives at a Redwood City veterinary clinic, also has a sixth sense. Dubbing him a "guardian angel," "wonder cat" and "miracle kitty," the staff and volunteers at the Nine Lives Foundation's Feline Well-Care Clinic say Christopher can tell when other cats need help. He will sit outside the cages of sick felines until someone lets him in, and last month, the clinic says, he saved the life of a kitten in need of a blood transfusion. "It's weird, it's really true that he seems to understand...

This is a ping to try to help save a couple young kittens who were either tortured or simply caught in a trap.

LIMA, Peru (AP) -- Murder defendant Joran van der Sloot has refused to discuss his case with the Peruvian judge assigned to it. Judge Carlos Morales visited the 22-year-old Dutchman on Monday at Castro Castro prison in eastern Lima.

The father of Channon Christian made a vow Friday to Lemaricus Davidson, the convicted ringleader in her kidnapping, rape, torture and murder. "I will do everything in my power to see that they stick that needle in you as soon as possible," Gary Christian said during Davidson's second sentencing hearing. Davidson is already under two death sentences for the 2007 murders of Christian, a 21-year-old University of Tennessee senior, and her boyfriend, Christopher Newsom, 23. He was back in Knox County Criminal Court to be sentenced on the other charges related to the crimes.

Arraignment today for teen in Yule killing Trial date scheduled in Salvation Army murder JOHN LYNCH ARDEMGAZ The teenager accused of gunning down a Salvation Army officer on Christmas Eve makes his first appearance today in Pulaski County Circuit Court to answer capital murder and aggravated robbery charges. Laquan Javaris Fitzpatrick, 19, who has addresses in Little Rock and Helena-West Helena, is to appear before Circuit Judge Barry Sims at 1:30 p.m. for arraignment on charges that carry the death penalty. The judge will also set trial dates for Fitzpatrick. Accused of killing Salvation Army Maj. Philip Wise on Dec....

MARYSVILLE, Ohio -- A man accused of abusing cows at a local dairy farm said in court Thursday that he is studying to become a police officer in Ohio. Billy Joe Gregg, 25, appeared in court, charged with 12 counts of cruelty to animals. The charges against Gregg were filed after an animal welfare group released graphic video Tuesday that was secretly recorded and shows workers at Conklin Dairy Farms in Plain City beating cows with crowbars, stabbing them with pitchforks and punching them in their heads. The video shows workers holding down newborn calves and stomping on their heads....

Despite protests from human rights groups, Sani Ahmed Yerima, a 49-year-old senator in the Nigerian government, has just married a 13-year-old girl. This will be his fourth wife, and he bought her for… er… paid her Egyptian parents a dowry of $100,000. Of course, Senator Yerima doesn't much care what the critics say. He has Islam on his side: "The Prophet Mohammed married at the age of nine, therefore any Muslim who marries a girl of nine years and above, is following the teachings of the Prophet," Yerima told Al Jazeera….[I]n Nigeria’s predominantly Muslim north, weddings of underage people do...

SEATTLE -- A Washington state jury says a man convicted of killing the family of a National Guard sergeant who was serving in Iraq, then burning down the house in an attempt to conceal the crime, should be sentenced to death. The King County Superior Court jury's decision was read by Judge Gregory Canova on Wednesday and was met by silence in the courtroom. Conner Schierman was convicted last month of four counts of aggravated first-degree murder and one count of arson in the 2006 stabbing deaths of 28-year-old Olga Milkin, her two young sons and her sister. No clear...

(04-23) 18:50 PDT OAKLAND -- Prosecutors had no grounds to file murder charges in the fatal beating of a 59-year-old San Francisco man on a downtown Oakland street, an attorney for one of the defendants said Friday, describing his client as "not an evil person." "This is not a murder case. This is a case that, in our opinion, has been overcharged," Adanté Pointer, attorney for defendant Lavonte Drummer, 18, said after a brief hearing in an Oakland courtroom. Pointer said the case could be "something else," but did not elaborate on any potential defense. Drummer and Dominic Davis, 18,...

A teenager charged with crashing a van into a house, killing a woman gardening, told police she didn't feel so bad after learning the victim's age. According to court documents obtained by CBS Radio's 1010WINS, Kayla Gerdes was quoted in a written statement to police saying: "The thing that made me not feel so bad was she was old," she said. "I mean, 70 years is a long time to live." Then, on a completely separate note, she told police: "I want to see a newspaper or the news to see what I look like." Gerdes is facing vehicular manslaughter...

She mowed down a helpless, elderly woman while driving a van high on drugs, but a twisted Long Island teen still claimed to see a bright side to the horrific crash. "The thing that made me not feel so bad was, she was old," hellcat Kayla Gerdes, 18, told investigators after she was busted for killing 69-year-old Rebecca Twine Wright as the retired doctor trimmed her lawn Tuesday, a source told The Post. Gerdes, of Freeport, claimed to once be a model. And she was so self-absorbed in the hours after the wreck that she told cops interviewing her she...

Police are investigating the death of a 56-year-old Far South Side man whose daughter came home Sunday night to find him covered in blood and apparently killed by the pit bulls she was raising, police sources said. Johnny Wilson was found in the living room of his home in the 10200 block of South Aberdeen Street with numerous bite marks on his body, according to the Cook County medical examiner's office. Other sources said he suffered massive head, chest and upper body trauma.

A pet owner knows the enormous joy and comfort that an animal can provide, especially in troubled times. Most pets are considered important members of the family and irreplaceable companions. A growing body of research now documents the value of the human-animal bond in child development, elderly care, mental illness, physical impairment, dementia, abuse and trauma recovery, and the rehabilitation of incarcerated youth and adults. In two articles in a recent issue of Family Process, titled "Human-Animal Bonds I," (focused on the benefits of companion animals) and "Human-Animal Bonds II," (focused on their role in couple and family dynamics and...

KNOXVILLE - A Knox County jury this afternoon sentenced convicted torture-slaying ringleader Lemaricus Davidson to death by lethal injection for the January 2007 murders of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom. The jury of five women and seven men deliberated about four hours before returning its decision to a packed courtroom. “The punishment is death,” the jury foreman said.

KNOXVILLE - A Knox County jury this afternoon sentenced convicted torture-slaying ringleader Lemaricus Davidson to death by lethal injection for the January 2007 murders of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom. The jury of five women and seven men deliberated about four hours before returning its decision to a packed courtroom. “The punishment is death,” the jury foreman said. The victims' families gasped at the verdict, but Davidson showed no reaction. Criminal Court Judge Richard Baumgartner admonished those in the courtroom to control any outburst. “The murder was especially heinous, atrocious and cruel,” the foreman said, reading from the verdict form....

A Knox County jury delivered the death sentence this afternoon to the ringleader in the torture slayings of a young Knoxville couple following a carjacking. The same panel of seven men and five women who convicted Lemaricus Davidson, 28, in the 2007 attack on University of Tennessee student Channon Christian, 21, and her boyfriend Christopher Newsom, 23, decided his fate. Davidson was found guilty of more than 30 counts, including felony murder and premeditated murder of each victim. The jury had a choice of a life sentence mandating a minimum of 51 years in prison, life without parole with no...

Two decades after the devil-worshiping "Night Stalker" killer was sentenced to die for 13 Southern California murders, DNA evidence has tied him to the 1984 rape and slaying of a 9-year-old girl in the Tenderloin, San Francisco authorities said Thursday. The DNA links Richard Ramirez and possibly a second, unknown attacker to the April 10, 1984, killing of Mei "Linda" Leung, whose body was found hanging over a pipe in the basement of her apartment building at 765 O'Farrell St., police said. The girl was with her 8-year-old brother when she lost a dollar bill and went looking for it,...

By Andrew W. Griffin Red Dirt Report, editor Posted: October 7, 2009 reddirtreporter@gmail.com OKLAHOMA CITY – Back in July, we here at Red Dirt Report noted how the radical animal-rights organization People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) had blood on their hands no thanks to their decision to kill 95 percent of the dogs and cats put in their care in 2008. PETA found homes for less than one out of every 300 animals at their so-called “shelters.” PETA loves animals, right? It’s not looking that way. Just check out the informative website Petakillsanimals.com for more information. And...

(click here, or at source link above.)

Send Correction Plainfield — An animal control officer was injured late Tuesday night when a pit bull lunged at her and knocked her to the ground. Animal Control Officer Theresa Foss, a 17-year veteran, responded to the call at the Roberts' residence at 270 Green Hollow Road about 10:48 p.m. after it was reported the dog would not let a resident exit the house. The dog alternated from the front and rear doors of the house, police said. The dog does not belong to the Roberts. The dog is described as a pit bull, white in color with some brown...

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) - As police charged a Yale animal lab technician with murdering a graduate student who worked in his building, a portrait began to emerge Thursday of an unpleasant stickler for the rules who often clashed with researchers and considered the mice cages his personal fiefdom.

NORCO-- A man is accused of repeatedly forcing a 12 year old girl to have sex with him as well as forcing her to sell marijuana, sheriffs officials say. Julio Louis Cortes, 25, of Westminster is suspected of forcing the 12 year old female victim to have sex and to sell marijuana for the past six months. During the sexual assaults, Cortes threatened the 12 year old at gunpoint, said Sgt. Matthew Sims of the Norco Sheriff's Department. Cortes was arrested on Friday September 11th after deputies received a report of sexual assault from the 12 year old female victim....

The number of animals and plants protected by the federal Endangered Species Act is about to increase dramatically. For Cass Sunstein, radical animal-rights activist and nominee for the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) Administrator job, that means he will be better positioned than ever to make livestock farming a thing of the past.How are the two things connected? Our director of research appeared on the Fox News Channel yesterday to explain to Glenn Beck’s audience how much influence Sunstein may soon have over what we eat: Cattlemen in this country own and manage most of the lands...

HUNTINGTON BEACH: A Huntington Beach man was arrested Wednesday afternoon on allegations he abducted, sodomized and raped an autistic 7-year-old girl. The girl was playing in the back yard of her apartment complex when she was taken against her will to a neighboring apartment, where she was assaulted and then released, Huntington Beach Police said in a news release issued late Friday The girl's parents called the police and after interviewing her and witnesses, arrested Daniel Blas Flores, 27, who they found hiding in the bedroom of his apartment.

Desmond Hatchett's children have 11 different mums and their ages range from a newborn to 11-years-old. The prolific father even boasted of fathering four tots by different women in the same year His giant brood came to light after authorities in Tennessee took Hatchett to court for non payment of child support. [snip] Hatchett, who earns minimum wage, told reporters he knows the names and ages of all his children. [snip] Hatchett's lawyer Keith Pope said: "The children can't all be supported by Desmond, so the state of Tennessee has had to step in."