As I have mentioned in previous posts, we are now aware that children who abuse animals are at higher risk of becoming child and/or spouse abusers in adulthood.
Some extreme examples of that connection having been ignored with horrifying outcomes is seen in the cases of Jeffrey Dahmer and Paul Bernardo.
As a child, Dahlmer had been known to impale the skulls of small animals in his backyard.
Bernardo had killed his wife's iguana after it bit him, and then they ate the animal.
Even Marc Lepine had a history of gratuitously shooting pigeons as a child.
Harsh? Sickening? Yes - and that is precisely why this issue bears much more notoriety and concern than is currently being given.
As far back as the 1970s, studies showed that 36% of convicted multiple murderers had inflicted repeated severe suffering on animals as children, and 46% did so as teenagers. The more recent stats give us an even more bleak picture.
Anthropologist Margaret Mead once noted that: "One of the most dangerous things that can happen to a child is to kill or torture an animal and get away with it."
The only promise for eliminating a vast majority of this violence in adults is to intervene when they are children. Psychologist Randall Lockwood, VP of training initiatives with the HSUS in Washington states: "You can intercept the trajectory of violence."
An initiative put forth by a Women's shelter in Hamilton, Ontario was the first to establish a link with the Ont. SPCA, Social Services, Legal and Law Enforcement agencies and other organizations. When an OSPCA officer investigates a case of animal abuse, he/she might then notify the local children's aid society about the violence in the home. Notice the word 'might' - this was not an actual policy at the time of this report.
The link following this post is to a U.S. organization that is gathering information and urging this type of intervention for all communities. We desperately need to spend time with the children who are either exposed to abuse in the home - human or animal - or who themselves are inflicting injury to animals...the simple act of prevention now will alleviate a lot of suffering in the future.
Our best friend can once again show us the way to non-violent behaviour.

:http://www.ncjrs.gov/html/ojjdp/jjbul2001_9_2/contents.html