Certainly. With regard to cockfighting in the jurisdiction that I work in, for some of the individuals, the rate of recidivism is high. We've charged a number of individuals and have been successful in convictions for only a small handful of these individuals. They are the same people who are involved in breeding, training and transporting these birds to cockfight arenas or cockpits where these animals are fought.
Currently, the legislation only allows us to enter a premise with a search warrant when we have reason to believe that animals are being fought and, in order to proceed, we're looking at somebody either aiding or abetting who would be present at a cockfight. We have to, one, have the actual event taking place, and two, we have to have evidence of a cockpit in order for us to proceed under the Criminal Code. Both are extremely difficult.
There is a farm that is very close to the headquarters for our cruelty investigations department where these birds are raised specifically for the purpose of fighting. Birds are tied out on barrels. They're kept within close proximity of each other. They're no more than a foot apart. These birds are always in a heightened state of excitement because they're bred specifically for fighting. The hens are permitted to wander amongst the cocks, which further heightens the excitement level of these animals. These animals are constantly at a level of heightened excitement, and they're literally in the numbers of hundreds, if not thousands.
I talked about the 1,270 birds that were euthanized in 2008, and the same characters that we were dealing with in 2008 are operating not far from where we are located and are raising the birds in exactly the same conditions they were raising them in in 2008. The difference was that in 2008 we actually found cockpits, which enabled us to take those birds and go to a justice.
As it stands now, we've executed warrants on the properties and have not found any evidence of pits, which would lead us to suspect that the fights are occurring off-site, but the birds are being raised on-site.
In changing the legislation for breeding, training or transporting these birds, it would certainly help the B.C. SPCA to deal with the situation.