The illegal dogfights discovered in Ypäjä in southwestern Finland in March 2007 have brought charges to four organisers of the fights.
Prosecutor Petri Rouhiainen demanded at the Forssa District Court on Wednesday that two of the men should be sentenced to unconditional imprisonment, while two others should be given a suspended prison sentence.
Six two-dog fights were arranged in Ypäjä last March, as a result of which one of the dogs had to be put to death because of its injuries.
Just three of the four defendants were present at the court. They admittted to having organised the fights or at least to having been involved when the dogs were separated.
The accused men stated they did not regard their activities as cruel in the way the prosecutor had described them. They insisted that they had just been testing the animals.
According to the prosecutor, all suspects were guilty of a violation of animal protection laws.
In addition, he demanded that the defendants be served with a life-long ban on keeping dogs.
The investigations in Finland began after the British Broadcasting Corporation BBC contacted Finland’s National Bureau of Investigation. While looking into dogfights in Britain and Northern Ireland for the Panorama programme, the BBC had uncovered links to Finland.
The case of dog-breeders exporting animals illegally under false papers is likely to come to trial later in the spring.
