{"id":356615,"date":"2026-03-31T09:43:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:43:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/356615\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T09:43:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:43:12","slug":"whakatane-puppy-drowning-video-streamed-to-social-media","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/356615\/","title":{"rendered":"Whakat\u0101ne puppy drowning video streamed to social media"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"no<\/p>\n

\nThe puppies were taken out of a pillowcase and thrown into the Whakat\u0101ne River. File photo.
\nPhoto: RNZ \/ Rebekah Parsons-King\n<\/p>\n

Two young men allegedly filmed themselves drowning young puppies in the Whakat\u0101ne River and posted the video to social media last night.<\/p>\n

A 19-year-old man has been charged with cruelty to an animal, and a 17-year-old male has been referred to Youth Aid after the incident.<\/p>\n

Senior Sergeant Cam MacKinnon said police were contacted just before 6pm on Monday by members of the public who had seen a video on social media of two males allegedly throwing very young puppies in the Whakat\u0101ne River.<\/p>\n

“We received information from the public who saw the males take the puppies out of what looked to be a pillowcase and throw them into the Whakat\u0101ne River, while filming their senseless activity.”<\/p>\n

MacKinnon said the puppies tragically drowned in the river.<\/p>\n

“This type of wilful ill-treatment towards animals is unacceptable in any form and is an offence under the Animal Welfare Act 1999.<\/p>\n

“As with this incident or any similar behaviour, we will robustly work to hold these offenders to account for their actions and this includes restrictions on bail during court proceedings.”<\/p>\n

Both offenders were soon located by police.<\/p>\n

“Police would like to acknowledge the members of the public who contacted and assisted police with this incident,” said MacKinnon.<\/p>\n

Sign up for Ng\u0101 Pitopito K\u014drero, a daily newsletter<\/a> curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The puppies were taken out of a pillowcase and thrown into the Whakat\u0101ne River. File photo. Photo: RNZ…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":356616,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[48,47,42,43,49,46,44,45,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-356615","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-audio","9":"tag-current-affairs","10":"tag-headlines","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-podcasts","13":"tag-public-radio","14":"tag-radio-new-zealand","15":"tag-rnz","16":"tag-top-news","17":"tag-top-stories","18":"tag-topnews","19":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=356615"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356615\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/356616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=356615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=356615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=356615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}