Man who bludgeoned six penguins walks free from court

An Australian man who bludgeoned six penguins to death has had his punishment increased, but will not spend time behind bars.

Joshua Leigh Jeffrey, 20, must carry out 98 hours of community service - double the amount he was initially handed in June - as well as a two-month prison sentence, suspended on condition that he does not reoffend within the next 12 months.

The harsher punishment was handed down after a court upheld an appeal by the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, which described Jeffrey’s initial sentence as “manifestly inadequate”.

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Jeffrey and another man used sticks to attack a group of fairy penguins at Sulphur Creek in north-west Tasmania on New Year’s Day 2016.

The seabirds, native to southern Australia and New Zealand, are the smallest species of penguin.

Nine fairy penguins were subsequently found dead at the scene, although the cause of death of three of them could not be established, the ABC reports.

In April, Jeffrey was found guilty of aggravated cruelty to animal. Two months later, he was sentenced to 49 hours of community service and ordered to pay court costs of AUS$82.15 (£44.50) - a sentence which animal rights activists dismissed it as a “slap on the wrist”.

At the time, Dr Eric Woehler from Birds Tasmania issued a statement expressing the organisation’s “extreme disappointment”.

Woehler said that the fairy penguin colony at Sulphur Creek would take “years to recover” from the attack and that the court’s leniency was “no deterrent whatsoever” to future attacks.

“The current penalties are clearly failing to prevent the cruel and senseless killing of wildlife in Tasmania,” he said, adding: “There is no deterrence in this sentence.”

The case also provoked uproar among the press and public, prompting a debate as to whether current legislation needed to be updated to recognise contemporary attitudes towards abuse of animals.

“Animal cruelty has become a much more serious issue in the minds of the public in recent decades, and the laws have not kept up with that changing attitude,” regional newspaper The Advocate said in a June editorial, urging mandatory prison sentences for extreme acts of animal cruelty.

RSPCA Tasmania executive officer Andrew Byrne today told The Advocate that the organisation was “pleased” with the harsher penalty.

“Hopefully this will send a strong message to the community that animal cruelty will not be tolerated on any level,” he added.