The killing of a police bloodhound who helped find nine people over the course of his sniffer-dog rescue career has outraged Italians and sparked a criminal investigation to find his killers.
Bruno, a seven-year-old, 88-kilogram (195-pound) bloodhound, was found dead on Friday morning in his shed in southern Taranto.
His trainer, Arcangelo Caressa, said he had been fed bits of dog food laced with nails.
In an interview on Tuesday, Mr Caressa said he suspected the killing was revenge against him — not Bruno — for his volunteer animal rescue work.
“It was deliberately a horrific act to cause the dog intense suffering, because feeding him bites filled with nails means tearing apart his insides, tearing apart his esophagus and internal organs and causing excruciating pain,” Mr Caressa told The Associated Press.
Premier Giorgia Meloni, who was photographed with Bruno after one of his heroic rescues, said that his slaughter was “vile, cowardly, unacceptable”.
Legislator Michael Vittoria Brambilla, a long-time animal rights activist, filed a criminal complaint with prosecutors under a new law that she helped push through stiffening penalties for anyone who kills or mistreats an animal.
The editor of the Il Giornale daily, Vittorio Feltri, voiced outrage, saying Bruno had done more civic good in Italy than most Italian citizens.
Mr Caressa said that he had told prosecutors that he suspected that he was the ultimate target of Bruno’s killers, and that Bruno was killed “to get to me”.
Mr Caressa runs a volunteer public animal rescue organisation, Endas, that among other things rescues dogs from illegal dogfights.
He said the service used to be run by for-profit firms and said he suspected that his competitors were behind Bruno’s killing.
“In recent months, we have received threats, acts of persecution, defamation and slander from certain individuals who have already been investigated in the past and are known to the judicial authorities, who have been trying in every way to take over this rescue service by despicable means,” Mr Caressa told The Associated Press.
The new animal protection law, known as the Brambilla law, went into effect on July 1 and calls for up to four years in prison and a 60,000-euro (around £51,000) fine, with the stiffest penalties applied if the mistreatment is committed in front of children or is filmed and disseminated online.
Mr Feltri said that the penalty should be even greater than four years, saying animals must be respected “especially when they behave heroically” as Bruno had.
Mr Caressa said that Bruno might have appeared clumsy and overweight, but was powerful, strong and dedicated to his job.
“He was a giant,” said Mr Caressa. “When he went out on a search and you put his harness on, there was no one else like him.
“He would set off, smell the person we were looking for and run like a train until we found them.”
Officially, his record stands at nine people found – five people who were alive and four whose bodies were recovered, he said.
“But the motto for us rescuers is always the same: Bring the missing person home in any case, because there is always someone among their relatives who is looking for that missing person,” he said.
