The owner of a dog breeding facility in Hwaseong, Gyeonggi Province, has been sentenced to prison and taken into custody after being found guilty of crimes including performing cesarean sections on live dogs and illegally euthanizing sick animals.

Judge Seo Jin-won of the Suwon District Court sentenced the former representative of the breeding facility, identified as A, to one year and six months in prison and a fine of 3 million won for violating the Animal Protection Act, the Veterinarians Act, and the Building Act.

A co-operator, B, was sentenced to one year and two months in prison.

The court ordered the immediate detention of A and B, citing a flight risk.

Another operator, C, received a one-year prison sentence suspended for three years, while employees D and E were each given eight-month sentences suspended for two years.

The court also ordered them to complete 120 to 200 hours of community service.

Between May 2022 and August 2023, A and others operated a dog breeding facility in Hwaseong and were indicted without detention for performing abdominal surgeries on live mother dogs to extract puppies without a veterinary license, resulting in the deaths of the mothers.

They were also charged with killing 15 elderly dogs infected with contagious diseases by injecting them with muscle relaxants and performing self-treatment on the dogs by administering vaccines and antibiotics without a veterinary license.

Investigations revealed that while they kept as many as 1,400 dogs, the number of staff members was severely insufficient to manage them properly.

When authorities arrived following the initial report, they discovered 92 dog carcasses wrapped in newspaper inside a freezer at the facility.

During the trial, A and the other defendants denied the charges, claiming, "The mother dogs were already dead, and even if they were alive, the actions constituted emergency rescue and justifiable conduct to save the puppies."

However, Judge Seo rejected all of their arguments based on disease diagnosis results from the Animal and Plant Quarantine Agency.

Judge Seo stated, "Given that biological reactions such as bleeding and inflammatory cells were observed in the skin tissue after the incisions, it is recognized beyond a reasonable doubt that the mother dogs were alive at the time of the surgeries."

Regarding the claim of emergency rescue, the judge stated, "Even if there was an intention to save the puppies, the act of cutting open the abdomen on the spot without taking appropriate measures, such as taking the dogs to an animal hospital, cannot be accepted under general social norms."

The charges of illegally euthanizing old and sick dogs that had lost their economic value by injecting them with muscle relaxants were also upheld.

Judge Seo explained, "It is recognized that the dogs were euthanized under the instructions of the operators, and this cannot be viewed as a justifiable reason or an emergency rescue."

The court added that the charge of administering vaccines without a veterinary license was also valid, stating, "Companion dogs cannot be considered livestock, so these actions cannot be justified as self-treatment by a livestock farm."

In explaining the sentencing, the court stated, "The behavior shows an extreme disregard for life, suggesting that the animals' lives could be taken at any time for economic gain, making the illegality and culpability significantly high." The court added, "However, we took into account that they admitted to some of the crimes, that the employees were passively following orders, and that they had no prior criminal records."

(Photo: Provided by Suwon District Prosecutors' Office, Yonhap News)