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SHAME OF ANIMALS TORTURED ON VIDEO; TV SPY MAKES CASH FROM VILE DOSSIER
(cutting from The People July 29th 2001 by David Brown) Sent in by lady from London thankyou.
AN undercover TV reporter has sparked fury by selling a gruesome animal torture video for profit. Graham Hall, who was once kidnapped and attacked by animal rights fanatics, believes he will make a fortune.
The RSPCA fear it will encourage psychos to copy its revolting scenes. The 55-minute tape features horrific killings of cats, dogs, foxes, badgers and cocks. Its sound-track records their pitiful howls of pain. In one harrowing scene, badgers are pulled from a sett, stabbed and thrown to the dogs. Another spine-chilling clip shows a man slowly torturing a screeching cat in his cellar. And a third features a man smashing a fox's skull with a shovel as blood spurts from its ears. Hall, 45, won a BAFTA award for his work exposing the awful cruelty suffered by animals.
Now he says: "It's about time I got something back for the work I've done. If I make money out of it, fine. "This film is a compilation of my undercover work. The intention is to shock and revolt."
An RSPCA spokeswoman said: "We would question why anybody would be selling this sort of material. "It could actually encourage the sort of behaviour it claims to be exposing. "Why would people need to pay to see this sort of thing? There is a danger that it is supplying a very sinister market."
John Robins of Animal Concern said: "This is likely to appeal to perverted and sadistic people. "Why would any animal lover want to see it? There is a very sick market for this type of material. "The danger is it glorifies violence towards animals and gives kicks to some very twisted people."
Hall will market the £20 film on the internet because he knows it will not get a certificate from the British Board of Film Classification. That could bring him an unlimited fine or two years in prison for breaking the 1984 Video Recordings Act if it is supplied in Britain.
An American firm has already shown interest in acquiring the overseas rights. Hall, from Herefordshire, says he needs the money because he has not worked since he was attacked by the Animal Liberation Front in October 1999.
He claimed he was abducted and then had the initials ALF burned into his back after infiltrating the group for Channel 4's Dispatches.When confronted by the Sunday People he said: "I'm too proud to go on the dole so I have had to sell most of my cine equipment and do odd jobs to support my family. "I have spent the past 20 years exposing animal cruelty in all forms. "It's time to wake people up to the casual sadism that goes on all over the country." Hall added: "I felt it was time to show in gory detail exactly what I have been campaigning against. "I'm the first to agree the film will make people sick. That's the intention. "I have nothing to be ashamed of in bringing out this film." /cutting ends