Jail looms for vet on cruelty

A VET banned from keeping animals after she was convicted of gross animal cruelty is facing jail after claiming she did not understand she couldn't keep dogs, horses and a bird.

Julie Tilbrook wept in court yesterday as she held up a photo of one of her horses, telling a magistrate it felt sad and knew welfare inspectors were coming to take it.
RSPCA officers seized two stallions, five dogs and a canary - all in good condition - from her Lara property in January.
Tilbrook yesterday faced Geelong Magistrates' Court to answer eight new charges of owning animals in violation of a court order.
The fresh charges breached a six-month suspended sentence imposed last September after she was found guilty of starving and mistreating 22 horses, some of which were near death.
She was disqualified from owning animals for five years.
The court yesterday heard that Tilbrook last year applied for a stay of an order to remove the dogs, horses and bird so she could appeal the magistrate's ruling.
But it was rejected by a County Court judge on December 20 last year, meaning she could no longer keep the animals.
On January 15 RSPCA inspectors seized a Jack Russell terrier, four kelpies, two stallions and a canary.
Tilbrook, who represented herself, said she was distressed and confused by the judge's decision, and asked her daughters to feed the animals while she got legal advice.
"I told my daughter, 'I'm going to get out of town because I have a feeling they are going to lock me up'."
Tilbrook said she camped "up country" with no water because she feared a set-up.
She said she was forced back to her Lara house because it was being vandalised, but claimed she did not go near the animals.
Tilbrook showed magistrate Michael Coghlan a picture of a stallion removed by the RSPCA in January.
"This is a very sad horse. That is a horse who knows he is the next one. He has seen people come to the property and take away his herd," she said, crying.
Mr Coghlan said Tilbrook organised someone else to care for the animals because she knew the ban was in effect and was trying to get around it.
He said he was satisfied the animals were in her possession.
Mr Coghlan urged Tilbrook to hire a lawyer and arrange material relating to mental health problems.
"You are facing a significant term of imprisonment. It concerns me there may be material that may put things in a different light," he said.
Prosecutor Andrew Halse said the RSPCA hoped to find the animals new owners.
Tilbrook faces court on May 29. Click here to go to the Herald Sun website for this story

Being saddled with injuries is a royal pain

FUNNILY enough, my interest in equestrianism dates back to the day I bumped into Princess Anne's husband, Captain Mark Phillips, in the gents' toilets at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. "Why the long face?" I asked unoriginally.

"Foggy" Phillips - as he was nicknamed by army chums on account of his wetness and thickness - paused, processed the question and mumbled something about "lots of aches and pains" before trying to exit through a broom cupboard.
Little was ever said about the horses, so one presumed Foggy, a British gold medallist at the Munich Games, was talking about injuries to the American riders he coached at Atlanta. But they were piffling compared with those of the two women in Australia's winning three-day event team.
Wendy Schaeffer competed on a still-broken leg, so painful she "walked" the course beforehand in a golf buggy. Gillian Rolton finished her round after twice falling off, chipping an elbow, breaking a collarbone and cracking two ribs.
Fond memories of the heroic "crocks of gold" came galloping back this week with the arrival of Trailblazers ($29.95, Rosenberg), the story of Australia's first Olympic equestrians, told by the only survivor, Wyatt "Bunty" Thompson and the writer Petronella McGovern.
It was 1956, the year of the Melbourne Olympics, but Australia's stringent quarantine regime meant the equestrian events were held in Stockholm. Never mind medal chances. As Bunty, a grazier from Trunkey Creek, near Bathurst, explains, it was a major achievement for Australian riders and horses even to compete. Some horses, including "The Queen of Downunder", were shipped out in January during a heatwave into a British snowstorm. Others were bought on arrival. Several succumbed to equine flu. All were sold after competing.
The team followed by boat for a six-month campaign of acclimatisation and competition. They paid themselves a £2-a-week living allowance. They rode largely untried horses, brought the wrong saddles and had to buy special "English" clothes - red coats, white breeches, black boots.
More used to bush roughriding, Bunty and his five teammates had no experience of "European style". Indeed, their Viennese trainer was appalled to discover Australians believed dressage - which relates to the training and deportment of horses - meant being best dressed on parade.
Remarkably, the team finished just outside the medal places, in fourth place. As Bunty recalls, they rode a fast-learning curve. In Sweden, they were shocked by easygoing attitudes towards casual sex. In England, they struggled with etiquette.
At a cocktail party in Harewood House, Yorkshire, Bunty was talking to Prince Phillip, when he stepped back to make way for a waiter, crushing the toes of a woman behind him - the Queen Mother. That's the thing about equestrianism: you're always bumping into royals.