Vegan who stole lamb from farm admits animal cruelty

A vegan and self-proclaimed animal lover” has admitted animal cruelty and been banned from owning sheep after she stole a lamb from a farm and almost killed it with her failed attempts at hand-rearing.

- BRYONY GOOCH

Louise Murguia, 49, took the lamb from Stuart Ludwell’s Hile Farm in Dorset because she thought it had a broken leg and believed it wouldn’t survive the night. She took the lamb to her home where she shampooed it to remove the identifying number on its fleece and put it in a nappy, feeding it cow’s milk and specialist formula, which she bought on Amazon.

In the three weeks the lamb was confined to her house, the animal grew malnourished. When police turned up at her door to seize the baby, the lamb weighed almost half what it should have and needed more than a week of intensive treatment to ensure it survived.

Murguia, of Sturminster Newton, admitted to one offence of theft and one of causing unnecessary suffering to a protected animal in Bournemouth Crown Court.

Mr Ludwell found that his lamb was missing the morning after one of his ewes died on 23 March last year, leaving two lambs orphaned and needing hand-rearing. He decided to wait until the next morning to retrieve them so as not to distress the other ewes and their newborns by chasing the orphans in the dark.