Charity volunteers have accused Angus police of adopting a “couldn’t care less” approach to animal abandonment cases in the county.
The criticism has come from Help for Abandoned Animals after a claim the force has failed to act on potentially valuable leads in the case of a greyhound found dumped in Forfar almost three months ago.
Vets who examined the lactating young bitch said she had probably given birth to a litter of pups just days before being found, but no trace of them has been found and Angus HfAA vice-chairman Ian Robb spoke of his anger over the way the matter has been handled.
He said he had given police details of people willing to give information which may have assisted inquiries, but claims they have yet to be properly interviewed.
“I contacted the police in late August with details of people who saw the publicity surrounding this case and said they would be willing to provide information which might help track down the owner of this dog,” said Mr Robb. “I was very upset by this case and worried about the puppies so I went up to Forfar myself to see if I could find anything out.
“Through the people who came in contact with us I hoped that the police might be able to do something, but they have never spoken properly to them and I’ve been so annoyed with this I took it to (MSP) Andrew Welsh. The police regularly say how much they would like the help of the public on a whole range of things, such as drugs and other crime. Yet when it’s an animal thing like this I feel that we are just totally ignored.
“The welfare of these animals is what I give my time willingly for and I’ll fight tooth and nail for them.
“What annoys me more is to see other police forces across Scotland saying that the number of people being charged for animal abandonment cases is up.
“I appreciate that the police have a big workload to deal with and there are many serious issues, but this has been going on for months and there just seems to be a lack of interest in this type of case.”
Mr Robb added, “New legislation gives courts the powers to impose a huge fine, or put people to jail for abandonment cases but there’s no point in that if the police are not willing to put the work into tracking down people responsible for things like this, or if it gets to the procurator fiscal and that’s the end of it.”
A Tayside Police spokesman said, “Inquiries into this incident are still ongoing and officers have spoken to several individuals during their investigation. Mr Robb has been regularly updated with our inquiries.”