Horse-ripping - Incidents

Incidents

There were 160 reported incidents in Britain between 1983 and 1993, and 300 incidents in Germany between 1992 and 1998.

It has become a widespread belief in recent years that these attacks are carried out deliberately by people, and generally sexually motivated. Animal welfare officers have also drawn links between attacks on horses and 'fertility cults'. At least one case initially believed to be horse-ripping was later shown to have been caused by another horse.

Convictions are rare, though a man has been convicted in the Netherlands for a large number of such attacks on horses and ponies, along with the murder of a homeless person and the attempted murder of several others.

Horse-ripping, which is regarded as pathological, is distinguished from castration of male animals, which is regarded as a normal pastoral practice.

In Great Wyrley, England, during the Edwardian period George Edalji was wrongly convicted of horse ripping. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, author of the Sherlock Holmes series, defended Edalji.