The owners of the Circus Martin, Eusanio Martino and Adam Caroli, were condemned by the Tempio Pausania Court for animal abuse. Four months' imprisonment - the prosecutor had asked for six -, payment of court costs, compensation to the Lav (anti-vivisection League) and a provisional amount of 5 thousand euros.

The investigation started in the autumn of 2014, when the circus made a stop in Arzachena and ended up at the center of a national case, with the largest seizure of circus animals ever carried out in Italy. The carabinieri locked up all of Martin's animals: a hippopotamus, several camels and dromedaries, a lioness, zebras, horses, cattle and parrots.

The reason? The specimens were subjected to torture, behavior and unbearable fatigue, were malnourished and kept in conditions "incompatible" with their well-being.

In the process, the Lav, which was entrusted with the seized animals, filed a civil action.

“Finally, many years after the events, we can partly rejoice at the way this very ugly story ended - comments the president Gianluca Felicetti -. Unfortunately, the violence carried out by Circus Martin will remain an indelible wound for all the animals involved and are just one of the many cases in which animals are exploited in anachronistic contexts, only for the enjoyment of a few, very few citizens, and which involve violation. structural of the ethological needs of animals ".

A "just" sentence, he stresses, even if "hardly proportionate to the terrible facts", continues the executive who then urges Parliament and the government to approve "the law to prevent these behaviors by prohibiting the use of animals in shows, as already done by many other countries".

(Unioneonline / L)