How was Sarah Moulds found not guilty?

[DarkAndWild]

The local Look North news has just repeatedly shown the video of her kicking and hitting her horse whilst saying she was found not guilty.
She was on the news reading her statement saying the footage was taken out of context.
What context would be correct to treat any animal that way??!!
Its absolutely sickening that she wasn’t found guilty.

That's why I think a panel or jury of other experts with the relevent knowledge about the cases, would potentially be a better system.

The only vigilantism here is that which Moulds practised on the poor horse.

As a judge once said to a defendant ' You have been acquitted by a Limerick jury and are free to leave this court with no other stain on your conscience '. She was very fortunate that all she has to cope with is the opprobrium of decent people .

I'm not sure why we need dozens of threads on this subject, but whilst not defending her or what she did, I do not think that it consituted grounds to dismiss her or for there to be death threats etc., against her and her family. The behaviour of members of the public, including many on here, is disgusting. Many are no better than you allege her to be.

But I am also interested in the sheer hypocrisisy. Only a week ago the majority of posters on this site were literally a howling mob when one or two individuals questioned the guilty verdict in another high profile case and expressed concerns / qualms about it. in that case she was found guilty and that was the end of it. Now there's a howling mob screaming that a not guilty verdict is wrong and pretty much whipping up a lynch mob to see justice done. And you all think you are better than her? I'm struggling to see the difference.

I’ve been on the Hunt Facebook page and on their Twitter account and there is now no mention of the incident so they’ve taken it down. I know it was there originally as I remember being shocked, but not surprised, that they disowned her.

The horse owners that I know consider the treatment of her horse unacceptable.

Part Two of the Professional Standards is why she lost her job. It is not dependent on being convicted of a crime.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/665522/Teachers_standard_information.pdf

Because in one case there was debate about some of the evidence and it's reliability and accuracy.

I'n this case it was a video of the horse and what she did.

At least that's my interpretation

The media can only report on what is said in court, which as far as I can see they have done? Anything outside of that and they’ll be in danger of contempt.

There is no context in which repeatedly smacking and punching a pony in the head and kicking it could ever be acceptable. She was caught being extremely abusive and the evidence is completely reliable.

The Cottesmore Hunt is notorious round here.

Yup. I live near it. Its reputation is pretty poor.

My one interaction with it was watching it mill about down a main road, stopping traffic for 30 mins or more while it tried to get back in the scent. No sense of urgency to move or get the horses out of the way of cars etc.

Funny place to lay a scent trail huh?

Have I misunderstood this? Because it reads to me like the default is ‘pressure’ which the horse doesn’t like and you only release that when they’re doing something you want them to do? Seems equally cruel to me although I admit I’m not a horse person so don’t get it.

This - if there was video footage of LL murdering babies, I don’t think there would be any debate (or any discussions about why it took so long for her colleagues and hospital management to take action).

In this instance, we all know what she did because we have all seen the video. The question is why that wasn’t sufficient to get a conviction. It’s entirely possible that it really doesn’t meet the threshold, but I haven’t seen any posts or links confirming whether it does or doesn’t.

Incidentally if anyone does know the guidelines in this area, I would be genuinely interested to read them.

Its already been set out in the thread, its about whether the horse was considered to have suffered lasting harm/damage/injury

Which in my view shouldnt be the test and although others challenged what I said about psychological damage, I still believe that it would have been frightening for an animal to be treated like that

So by pressure I mean that in order to get a horse to move forwards you squeeze with your legs (squeeze not kick). As soon as the horse moves forwards you release the pressure of your leg. To get the horse to turn you use body/seat and reins, once the horse starts turning you release the rein and lighten the seat aids.
As soon as you sit on a horse you are applying pressure on its back even at a standstill so the aim is to be as balanced as possible in order to help, not hinder, the horse.

''@TheInterceptor
I presume the defence used the argument that horses are frequently physically chastised (spurs/whips etc.''

Er no, whips are only lightly used as aids when you are on the horse if it is not listening to your leg.

Not to randomly punish a horse or take out your frustrations on them...

I have never seen anyone ride with spurs and I would never used them.

What she was doing was blatant abuse.

That poor horse.

Ah sorry, I must have missed your post. That makes sense.

Isn’t she complaining how hard done by she was with the damage done to her reputation, and she lost her job as a teacher ?

She was found not guilty but atleast she’s been shamed and she will always be remembered for her actions. Always remembered as the teacher who punched a horse on camera

I can’t see how she can ever work with children again ? Even though she was found not guilty, I wouldn’t allow my kids to be taught by someone who abuses animals.

I can’t see any school touching her again because she’s toxic..

Cruelty doesn't always result in visible, physical injury. I can't get over the fact that part of the evidence hinged on vets examining the pony after the event and finding no visible injuries. Belting an animal is abuse. If someone had beaten one of the hounds around the head like this, and kicked it, I don't think there would be many people attempting to write it off as 'training' or discipline. I think that horses get belted and abused physically as much as they do because they don't howl and whimper as a dog would. It's quite commonly accepted though - just watch any bunch of kids doing a jumping lesson and listen for instructions to kick, kick, kick and 'give him a smack'.
From a training point of view, there is no benefit in doing anything to tell off a horse (or a dog for that matter) after the event has happened. The pony wandered off, was retrieved and returned to the transport. Then he was beaten around the head and kicked in the chest - so the message for him another time is to stay away from ramps.

For what it's worth I'm sure she's perfectly safe around children. Like many in the horse world she sees them as animals that it's OK to hit, and probably justifies it with out-dated talk of dominance and leadership in horses. It's the 'They do worse to each other' argument.

Let's just quote what she's said:
''If Bruce becomes a dangerous pony he cannot continue his idyllic life with us,' she said. 'In that moment he had done something incredibly dangerous, and in that moment I decided to discipline him. We have seen it slowed down in milliseconds, but in reality it was four seconds.
'There was minimal contact and no pain to my hand. Four seconds does not define a relationship between an owner and a horse.
'The purpose was to briefly shock him, to make him think: 'That was not a good idea to run away from my human'.'

He's not a dangerous pony. Someone let go of his reins and he wandered off a bit. He's out hunting, he's a type hard to find. He'd be snapped up if she didn't feel she could continue to give him a home.

Minimal contact - look at the impact in the video, she's deluded or simply a liar. But it's never OK to smack an animal around the face.

What she did is going to teach him that it's not a good idea to return to his human and the ramp of lorries. If your pony wanders off and is returned make a fuss of him, give him a treat FFS, help him to think that being with you is an awesome place to be. This is like recalling a dog then whacking it round the gob.

Neither spurs or whips should be used as punishment (though I do concede that ‘should’ is doing some heavy lifting there, less competent and conscientious riders may use them as such). There are strict rules regarding use of the whip in particular during competition eg during cross country it can be used to encourage on approach to a jump but only a maximum of 2 times per obstacle and may not be used following a refusal as a chastisement or on the flat between fences.

Spurs should be used to allow refinement of the leg aids. Think of them of being the equivalent to typing on a keyboard with a finger as opposed to using your full palm, essentially they allow more ‘buttons’ and nuance to be trained.

Whips allow an aid (signal) to be applied to where our body parts can’t reach and make the aid clearer to the horse. For example, when teaching leg yield (asking the horse to step forward then sideways so they move diagonally) a schooling (long) whip may be fluttered on the quarters behind where the leg can’t reach to encourage the hind end to move sideways in sync with the front end. Once the horse links the given aids with ‘step sideways and forwards’ the reinforcement on the long whip is no longer required.

A crop (short whip) may be used to maintain straightness or impulsion on approach to a jump so if the horse tends to ‘fall out’ on its right hand shoulder on left turn to a corner fence the rider may tap on the right shoulder to reinforce a straight (safer) line. The current BE and BS (and racing) rules on permitted crops are very strict, they are highly padded and soft enough that even if you tried to really smack with some force it shouldn’t hurt.

I think someone needs to step away from the keyboard.

Disappointed with the verdict as had she been kicking and punching a dog I'm sure it would have been seen as guilty. Though has been those in racing that have punched horses and only been disiplined by sports body.

I think what makes it worse is she easily caught the wandering horse and said not lashing out in anger (presumably as bad for job) and tried to justify the punishment as training which all suggests it's not a one off. They maybe large animals but still have very sensitive areas around head and nose she was hitting.

Hitting & kicking a horse like that will only cause it to become headshy and lose trust in people rather than behave. If you punish a dog for poor recall when catch it, it will have good reason to avoid being caught next time and you absolutely need your horse to want to come to you or wait if fall off without adding a fear of pain it may experience if caught, given prey animal their instinct will then be to run.

How can this be right in anyone’s world? It’s absolutely appalling that she got off!