A French court has fined the national rail operator SNCF €1,000 for negligence after a departing train ran over a cat hiding on the tracks at Paris's Montparnasse station. The incident occurred in January when the cat, named Neko, escaped from its travel bag and disappeared under a high-speed train preparing to leave for Bordeaux.
The cat's owners, Georgia and her 15-year-old daughter Melaina, said they spent 20 minutes trying to persuade staff to rescue the animal before the train departed, killing it. Melaina told the animal rights association 30 Million Friends: 'We saw him sliced in half. They told us it wasn’t their problem, that it was just a cat and that we should have had it on a leash.'
The death provoked outrage, with Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin declaring himself 'particularly shocked'. The Brigitte Bardot Foundation asked SNCF: 'Are you not ashamed?' The animal rights association filed a complaint for 'serious abuse and cruelty leading to the death of an animal', which carries a maximum fine of €75,000 and a five-year jail sentence.
However, the Paris court ruled the killing was caused 'involuntarily' and fined SNCF €1,000 for negligence, going against prosecutors who had called for the operator to be cleared of all charges. SNCF's travel agency branch was ordered to pay an additional €1,000 in damages to each of the two owners.
Following Neko's death, Darmanin announced that police officers in 4,000 stations across France would be trained to respond to animal trafficking and abuse.
