INQUIRER: Saturday evening, following a tip, Pennsylvania SPCA law enforcement officers arrested James Davis, 19, of the 2100 block of 22d Street in North Philadelphia, according to the Pennsylvania SPCA. If convicted, Davis faces up to two years in prison and a fine of at least $1,000, the PSPCA said. Davis admitted to impulsively taping up the cat after seeing it in the yard of the home where he lives with his parents, Bengal said. Davis left the cat in his yard for a couple of hours, then, because the animal kept screaming, tossed it into a neighbor’s yard, where at least 12 hours passed before she was noticed and authorities were contacted, Bengal said. The cat was found Tuesday in the backyard of a house in the 2200 block of Edgley Street. When asked how Davis managed to capture the cat, Bengal said, “The cat’s a very friendly cat.” MORE
RELATED: Authorities in Pennsylvania are offering up to $5,000 for information leading to the arrest and 
conviction of anyone involved in dogfighting. The reward was announced Monday in Philadelphia by Attorney General Tom Corbett and The Humane Society of the United States. It also applies to other animal combat, such as cockfighting. The Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals has received more than 400 complaints about dogfighting in the first six months of this year. That’s up from 245 complaints during all of 2008. MORE
TANGENTIALLY RELATED: Since beastiality is not technically a crime in New Jersey, investigators charged Melia with animal cruelty. And this, believe it or not, is where our story gets even weirder. Under state law, a prosecutor must prove the animal was tormented to in cruelty cases. Which led to a rather unusual argument in the court room. Burlington County assistant prosecutor Kevin Morgan was left to assert that forcing a cow to give you a blowjob — especially a young, innocent calve, which is what Melia fancied — fit the definition of cruelty. “I think any reasonable juror could infer that a man’s penis in the mouth of a calf is torment,” he told the judge. “It’s a crime against nature.” But that’s when Judge James J. Morley went a little weird on his own. He waxed philosophically about the mental powers of cows, noting that they couldn’t actually talk — a breakthrough observation — and thus had no way of expressing whether they liked giving degenerate cops blowjobs or not. And given that the jury had no way of reading the five cows’ minds — yes, Melia is a serial cow rapist — there’s no way the prosecution could prove the cows were tormented. Melia walked. MORE
[Artwork by RON ENGLISH]