A man who allegedly crushed 12 wombats in an Australian national park by repeatedly running over them in his car has been charged with cruelty, police said on Friday.
Police charged the 46-year-old man after the dead bear-like marsupials were discovered in the Wollemi National Park west of Sydney last week. Police said in a statement that they will allege in court that the wombats were run over by a vehicle, in some cases several times.
The body of one wombat has been sent to Taronga Park Zoo in Sydney, where animal specialists will try to determine how it died. Detective Senior Constable Ian Mitchell said it was hard to imagine why anyone would commit such a senseless act of cruelty.
He said police were working closely with park rangers to see if other animals in the park had been injured or killed. The man, whose name has not been released but comes from a small rural town west of Sydney, has been charged with aggravated cruelty, cruelty and harming native fauna.
The maximum fine or sentence he faces was not immediately known. He was released on bail, to appear in court on March 6. The wombat, a slow-moving marsupial native to Australia, has a large head, dark brown fur and short stumpy legs, making it look like a baby bear. Fully grown, it weighs about 26 kilograms and is one-metre long. – Sapa-AP