Cork pig farmer pleads guilty to cruelty and neglect

Defendant failed to treat or euthanise a pig after it was left in pen to be eaten alive

The owner of a Mitchelstown pig farm pleaded guilty yesterday to cruelty and neglect in relation to animals, including one count of an animal being left in a pen to be eaten alive.

A jury of nine men and three women was sworn in yesterday morning after Rory O’Brien and his wife Monica O’Brien of Killicane, Mitchelstown, Co Cork, and the farm manager, Seamus Curran of Kiltrislane, Mitchelstown, pleaded not guilty to a total of 88 counts related to alleged cruelty to animals.