Cat killer walks after mistrial

The big Cat Killer trial ended in a hung jury Friday and the Galveston prosecutor says he won't retry the case. [link]

We're not surprised in the least after learning the jury deliberated six hours yesterday without a verdict.

If the victim had been a stray dog that was fed by the toll bridge tender instead of a stray cat, we assert the chances of a guilty verdict would have been much better.

Dogs have a far superior public image with the general public when compared with cats, even though stray cats are not known for killing humans (notwithstanding reports of cats suffocating babies in their cribs, which we're not sure we believe) while dogs over the years have brought down quite a few people -- especially those nasty pit bulls.

On the other hand, a bird lover never would have assumed the job of judge, jury and executioner if a stray dog had been lurking under the toll bridge cause dogs, for the most part, are hopelessly inept when it comes to stalking and killing wild birds.

The defendant in the case, the president of the Galveston Ornithological Society, struck us as a rather nutty figure. He probably needs new hobby.

From what we read, there was a whole "colony" of feral cats living under the San Luis Pass bridge that apparently were stalking wild birds, including some that are considered "endangered."

Rather than grabbing his .22 rifle and loading it with hollow point bullets, a much wiser course of action for the defendant would have been to rally the support of cat lovers, animal rights activists, Boy Scouts, Cub Scouts, Camp Fire Girls, Explorer Scouts, convicted felons in need of contributing community service hours and whoever else might be willing to lend a hand, to launch an effort to trap the cats alive and find homes for them (after, of course, the local veterinarian community spayed and neutered the cats.)

This could have been underwritten by the Moody Foundation or the Harris & Eliza Kempner Fund or George Mitchell or Tilman Fertitta or one of those other people/groups that call the shots in Galveston.

Still and all, we applaud the Galveston County prosecutor for declining to retry the case.

He gave the public a chance to have its say via the jury system (the greatest judicial system in the world! despite the continuing problems with the conviction and sentencing of innocent people who are released after DNA analysis shows various juries and prosecutors made rather shocking mistakes of judgment) and the public, as it were, could not decide if it was cruel or not to shoot and kill a stray cat.

Some people just don't like cats.