Cruelty case in limbo after RSPCA bungle
1 May 2010
Last year more than 800 cows were allegedly starving to death on the land of millionaire pastoralist Tom Brinkworth.
The RSPCA found enough evidence to take the Brinkworths to court in what would have been one of the biggest animal cruelty cases in SA. If found guilty, the accused may have faced jail and fines of more than $1 million.
But just days before the case was to appear in the Magistrate’s Court in January a senior RSPCA employee revealed he had illegally tampered with documents and the RSPCA was unable to tender evidence.
The employee was sacked and three months ago the RSPCA and Government pledged to investigate.
The Government claims it still plans to follow up the investigation. But a spokesperson for new Environment Minister Paul Caica said the files had not yet been transferred to his office, so the Minister had not been able to consider the issue.
The RSPCA admitted the case fell apart because its former employee had forged a signature on a key document.
“The man disclosed to me over the Christmas period what had happened and we couldn’t ethically proceed with the case,” CEO Steve Lawrie said.
Meanwhile, Mr Brinkworth, who has appeared in court over several environmental issues and owns 68 properties in the south-east, moved last week to claim the full extent of his costs from the RSPCA.
Although the Government has handed over responsibility for prosecuting animal cruelty legislation to the RSPCA, the organisation receives only 10 per cent of its funding from taxpayers, relying on private donations.
The bungled investigation and the board’s handling of internal errors have reignited calls for the prosecution of RSPCA investigations to be managed by the Government.
Greens MLC Mark Parnell said the Minister should investigate whether a lack of funding was partly to blame for the botched case.
“It is outrageous that a private charity is forced to sell tea-towels or lamingtons to pay for investigating and prosecuting offenders on behalf of all of us,” Mr Parnell said.
South-east cattle farmer and artist James Darling would have been called as a witness against Mr Brinkworth.
“I was one of a great number of people who brought this to the attention of the RSPCA,” Mr Darling said.
He is adamant there is a need for a review of the responsibilities of the RSPCA and Government.
“This outcome is, for me, one more reason why there should be an independent commission against corruption,” Mr Darling said.
“I can’t see how the Government can stand aside in extremely large cases when it has the DPP and other officers to call upon to support the RSPCA.”
Mr Lawrie defended the organisation’s right to prosecute its cases.
“We’ve won every other case and the reason is because we do such a good job,” he said.
“The Government is unlikely to take over prosecution of RSPCA cases. They are getting a great deal getting a charity to do it. “
Mr Lawrie said only the RSPCA had the resources and skills to prosecute its cases, but acknowledged there was room for Government support.
“If it was turned over to either the police or Primary Industries, our feeling is that the job wouldn’t be done as well,” he said.
“We’ve written to the Environment Minister and suggested there needs to be some kind of access to expert advice or financial indemnity in particular cases when we are going up against some of the big companies.”
By Melissa Mack, The Independent Weekly
Source: http://www.animalsaustralia.org/media/in_the_news.php?article=1076
Meet the $200m bushy, Tom Brinkworth
PUBLISHED: 31 May 2013 00:05:00 | UPDATED: 31 May 2013 18:44:06
Brinkworth in a trophy room bearing the results of the family’s passion for hunting. Photo by Nic Walker
Tony Walker
Photo by Nic Walker
Tom Brinkworth is presiding in what he calls his home office – a farmer’s kitchen – with its skillets and meat hooks, cleavers and boning knives, venison chunks and homilies about life and work, and shelves crowded with sauce bottles and condiments. On a refrigerator door, a fridge magnet bears the Churchillian words: Never, Never, Never Give Up. Whatever else friends and detractors – and there are plenty of the latter – might say about the enigmatic 76-year-old, no-one would ever accuse him of giving up, certainly when it comes to accumulating land.
Can acquisition of land become an obsession, I ask? “No, it’s a habit,” Brinkworth laughs. He recounts a friend’s observation that: “Brinkworth would buy out the whole of Australia if the price was right.” Queensland is his next frontier beyond holdings in South Australia and NSW, judging by coloured-in sections of a map of southern Queensland on a long refectory table in a crowded “trophy room” adjoining the kitchen. Brinkworth’s hunting exploits are captured in the mounted heads and antlers of seven species of deer, wild boar and various species of duck. The latter reflects his passion for game-shooting on his wetlands properties.
Tom Brinkworth of Watervalley station, 50 kilometres west as the crow flies from Kingston in South Australia, controls, at last count, 1 million hectares of agricultural land spread across 99 properties in his home state and NSW. By the time this article appears, he may well have brought up his century, such is his appetite for additional land, provided the price is right.
“Every year we have to run so much faster to stand still,” he says of his land acquisitions and increase in stock numbers. He won’t be drawn on his net worth, beyond saying he is “worth more than $10”, but on a simple calculation, his assets – including property, livestock and machinery – would exceed $200 million. He avoids discussion about his preferred debt levels, apart from telling me he is “comfortable”. “Wealth is related to the smallness of wants,” he says.
He farms 350,000 sheep, 80,000 head of cattle, produces vast quantities of stock feed, has five large cattle trucks on the road permanently ferrying his stock between properties and market, and is constantly on the move himself. “Our aim is not necessarily to have the top price in the saleyard, but to have the most economic price,” he says.
source: http://www.afr.com/p/business/property/meet_the_bushy_tom_brinkworth_bbx85sIfAdyoF8QE0oabAI
Secret deal over Brinkworth alleged cruelty case
- July 23, 2010
One of the animals Thomas Brinkworth was accused of neglecting. Source: AdelaideNow
GRAZIER Thomas Brinkworth and the RSPCA have reached a confidential, out-of-court costs agreement over a botched animal cruelty case.
Both parties were today due to appear in the Adelaide Magistrates Court, but the hearing was vacated because of the agreement.
The court has previously heard Mr Brinkworth sought the RSPCA pay all his costs relating to the case.
RSPCA chief executive Steve Lawrie today said the agreement was a “reasonably satisfactory outcome for both parties”.
He said the agreement was subject to a confidentiality clause.
Mr Brinkworth, his wife Patricia and three of their employees had been accused of allowing about 800 cattle to suffer by being “gradually starved to death” during the drought in 2007.
Key evidence, however, was ruled inadmissible after a bureaucratic bungle by an RSPCA officer – who was later sacked for misconduct.
In January, the five accused were subsequently found not guilty of all 113 charges of animal cruelty filed by the RSPCA.
Mr Lawrie said the company now hoped to move on from the bungle.
“It’s been a long haul, but essentailly we are now in a position where we have learnt a lot of lessons from this,” he said.
“These kind of circumstances can’t be repeated in the future.”
He said there were many other animals which needed the RSPCA’s attention.
“We can now focus our attention to those matters.
“We are looking to focus on those things that really mater to us.”
Previously, the court heard one of the accused, Russell Scott Parham, was not seeking costs, while Mrs Brinkworth had settled with the non-profit organisation out of court for $1368.
The charges against the Brinkworths – who own 68 properties – related to 10 properties between Keith and Kingston in the state’s South-East. Guilty verdicts could have resulted in jail and fines exceeding $1 million.
In March last year, when the matter first reached the courts, then RSPCA operations manager Ben Johns described the matter as one of the biggest cases of alleged animal cruelty in South Australian history.
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