Sentencing of Dee Why cat killer Celina Shead delayed by mental health report backlog
A northern beaches woman — who pleaded guilty to killing her therapy cat by stabbing it 20 times — now has to wait until next month to be sentenced in court.
Manly
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The sentencing of a woman who stabbed a therapy cat 20 times before hurling its lifeless body out a second-storey window has been delayed.
Celina Shead, 20, of Dee Why, killed 11-year-old ‘Ginger’, which she had picked up from the RSPCA just five days earlier, in October last year.
Shead, who pleaded guilty to stabbing the cat to death, was to be sentenced in Manly Local Court on Tuesday, but the matter has been adjourned because a pre-sentence mental health report was not yet ready,
Magistrate Michelle Goodwin was told that there was a report backlog in Justice Health, the NSW Government agency responsible for health and welfare of people in the criminal justice system.
The pre-sentence report for Ms Goodwin to read would not be ready until at least February 18.
Shead was previously refused bail on one count of torture, beat and cause death of animal and one count of commit an act of aggravated cruelty upon an animal. She is also in jail on other matters.
A police facts sheet tendered to court last year said Shead’s neighbour in a block of units in Mooramba Rd heard the “sound of a cat in extreme distress” soon after 8am on October 23 and called police.
Before officers arrived the female neighbour saw the cat being thrown from Shead’s second-storey bedroom window.
The facts sheet said that Shead’s father told officers that “the cats did not seem to bond with his daughter … this seemed to upset her”.
When police entered the flat she shared with her father and older sister, Shead, who was diagnosed in late 2018 with borderline personality disorder, denied knowing anything about the dead cat.
Police found a knife on the kitchen bench and blood spots on a purple rug in the kitchen.
The cat was taken to Allambie Vets where X-rays revealed 20 puncture wounds on the right side of the body and 12 on the left, where the knife had gone right through the animal.
“Most organs were damaged or punctured,” the facts sheet said.
The RSPCA told police the two cats were used as therapy pets and had been with the RSPCA for 12 months.
Manly Local Court had previously been told that the attack on the cat came just six days after Shead was sentenced in Manly Local Court for 30 unrelated offences.
Court documents showed her crimes included assault occasioning actual bodily harm, being armed with the intent of committing an indictable offence, contravening an AVO and destroying or damaging property.
Shead has also pleaded guilty to stealing a dog — a Pomeranian called “Bella” — that had been tied up outside the Dee Why Grand shopping centre at 4.30pm on September 13.
Police later found the dog, with its coat dyed orange, at Shead’s home.
The matter will be back before Manly Local Court on Wednesday where it is set to be adjourned until mid-February for sentencing.