A man abused a 3 1/2-year-old toy poodle belonging to the brother of his then girlfriend for six months, culminating in the dog's death on Christmas Day in 2016.
On that day, Gerald Kok Zhin Oi, 23, flung the dog, named Treasure, three times towards a bed and it died after it hit the wall on the last occasion.
Yesterday, he was sentenced to 12 weeks' jail after admitting to four of seven charges of ill-treating Treasure at his former girlfriend's home in Toa Payoh between July and Dec 25 that year.
The private school student is also banned from owning an animal for one year from the date of his release from jail.
Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority (AVA) prosecutor Yap Teck Chuan told the court that Kok, who was then doing his national service, would stay over at his girlfriend's home.
Some time in late July 2016, Treasure bit Kok without any reason.
Suspecting that his sister's boyfriend had abused the animal, the dog's owner, Mr Ng Han Xiong, 30, installed a CCTV camera in his bedroom to keep an eye on Treasure. Mr Ng also told his mother not to leave Kok alone with the dog.
Mr Ng left for Japan on Dec 22 that year and switched on the CCTV camera.
On Christmas morning, Kok went to his girlfriend's flat.
At about 5.20pm, his girlfriend and her mother left for dinner, leaving him alone with Treasure.
At the void deck, the mother recalled that her son had told her not to leave the toy poodle alone with Kok.
The girlfriend immediately returned home and saw him standing near her room with bloodied tissue paper and Treasure lying motionless on the floor. He claimed that he had dropped Treasure accidentally after he slipped and fell while carrying it to her bedroom.
She took the dog to the vet, where it was pronounced dead. An X-ray showed Treasure had suffered neck and skull fractures due to blunt force trauma to the head.
CCTV footage showed Kok had hit Treasure with a sofa cushion and a plastic clothes hanger, before throwing it across the bed.
Mr Yap asked the court to impose a jail term of at least 31/2 months, saying Treasure suffered prolonged abuse and must have been traumatised.
Kok's lawyer Josephus Tan pleaded for a jail term of not more than 10 weeks, saying that his client is following up with the Institute of Mental Health to address anger management problems.
Kok, who was allowed to defer his sentence until March 1, could have been fined up to $15,000 and/or jailed for up to 18 months on each charge of ill-treating the dog.
