{"id":22265,"date":"2022-05-24T07:50:47","date_gmt":"2022-05-24T11:50:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/?p=22265"},"modified":"2022-05-24T07:50:47","modified_gmt":"2022-05-24T11:50:47","slug":"kurt-zouma-west-ham-defender-pleads-guilty-to-kicking-and-slapping-cat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/2022\/05\/24\/kurt-zouma-west-ham-defender-pleads-guilty-to-kicking-and-slapping-cat\/","title":{"rendered":"Kurt Zouma: West Ham defender pleads guilty to kicking and slapping cat"},"content":{"rendered":"

West Ham United defender Kurt Zouma has pleaded guilty to kicking and slapping his pet cat in a video that also showed him saying “I swear I’ll kill it”.<\/span><\/p>\n

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The 27-year-old admitted two offences under the Animal Welfare Act at a hearing at Thames Magistrates’ Court.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Zouma’s brother Yoan, who plays for Dagenham and Redbridge, admitted one offence after an RSPCA investigation.<\/span><\/p>\n

Yoan, 24, filmed the incident, which was posted on social media. Sentencing has been adjourned to 1 June.<\/span><\/p>\n

The brothers’ addresses were withheld following a court order.<\/span><\/p>\n

The court was told about disturbing footage of the incident, which was filmed at the West Ham player’s home and posted on Snapchat by his brother on 6 February.<\/span><\/p>\n

It was later seen by a woman who had been messaging Yoan, and she raised concern.<\/span><\/p>\n

Zouma could be seen volleying the Bengal cat across his kitchen, before throwing a pair of shoes at it and slapping its head.<\/span><\/p>\n

Prosecutor Hazel Stevens told the court Kurt could be heard saying: “I swear I’ll kill it, I swear I’ll kill it.”<\/span><\/p>\n

He admitted two counts of causing unnecessary suffering to a protected animal.<\/span><\/p>\n

Yoan admitted one count of aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring his older brother to commit an offence.<\/span><\/p>\n

Stevens said the offences appeared to be carried out after the cats were deemed responsible for damaging a chair in the home.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Kurt Zouma is determined to chastise or carry out some sort of retribution for the damage caused,” she said.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Since this footage was put in the public domain there has been a spate of people hitting cats and posting it on various social media sites.”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Since this footage was put in the public domain there has been a spate of people hitting cats and posting it on various social media sites.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Yoan<\/span><\/span>
Yoan Zouma covered his face with his hands as he arrived at Thames Magistrates’ Court<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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The court heard the Premier League defender, who apologised for his actions, has since agreed for his two Bengal male cats to be rehomed.<\/span><\/p>\n

Defending the West Ham player, Trevor Burke QC said his client had been fined \u00a3250,000 by his club and lost a “substantial” sponsorship deal with sportswear firm adidas.<\/span><\/p>\n

Zouma had also not been picked for the France national team.<\/span><\/p>\n

Burke said his client had been of previously impeccable character, and nine animal charities had benefited from his fine.<\/span><\/p>\n

He said the defender had suffered abuse, including threats and racial slurs, which has “totally disrupted his life”.<\/span><\/p>\n

Kurt arrived at court in chaotic fashion as several security guards emerged from a vehicle holding umbrellas to form a protective shield from camera crews and photographers around the defendant as he entered the court building.<\/span><\/p>\n

One other charge against each brother was withdrawn after their guilty pleas.<\/span><\/p>\n

Source: bbc.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

West Ham United defender Kurt Zouma has pleaded guilty to kicking and slapping his pet cat in a video that also showed him saying “I swear I’ll kill it”. The 27-year-old admitted two offences under […]<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22266,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,4],"tags":[8546,8545,5905],"class_list":{"0":"post-22265","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"category-uk","9":"tag-animal-welfare-act","10":"tag-kurt-zouma","11":"tag-thames-magistrates-court","12":"pmpro-has-access"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22265"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22265\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22268,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22265\/revisions\/22268"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22266"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}