UK Government: Move prosecution of animal abusers to Criminal/ crown court

Currently animal abuse cases are tried in Magistrate courts in the UK. The power of these courts only allow them to give a maximum jail sentence of 6 months, which is automatically reduced by half when a guilty plea is put forward prior to trail. This situation allows abusers to manipulate the system so they recieve a 3 month sentence for commiting horrendous crimes against animals. With the apparent increase of animal abuse crimes of increasing severity, a harsher punishment system needs to be put into place. The only way at present to achieve this is, if abuse cases are moved to criminal court which has the possiblilty of awarding harsher sentences.