"A cat is somebody's family member"

Tuesday 19 December 2017

The owner of a cat who was hit by car, and then dragged himself to his owners' home with a broken leg, is urging drivers to do more to help, if they hit an animal on the road.

Jessica Akers' 10-year-old cat, Monty, spent over a month in and out of the vets, and even had to have a skin graft to help mend his leg.

Monty has always been an outdoor cat and is used to living around busy roads. One Sunday morning, Mrs Akers found him in the hallway nursing his leg, which had quadrupled in size. She told Express: "His leg was shattered and there was blood everywhere. He had pulled himself back in from the back window. He didn't make a single complaint and didn't even try to alert my husband and I. 

"We rushed him to the vet. It wasn't clear exactly what the problem was because his leg was such a mess. The rest of him was fine. He was sedated and cleaned and the vet told us that it didn't look as if he had been run over but rather that he had ran into a car."

 Pictured: Monty recovering at home shortly after his accident.

Mrs Akers says that Monty came very close to losing his leg. "It was touch and go. The vet said that so much of his pad had to survive to make sure he would be able to put weight on this leg. It was awful. He is a lovely cat but he doesn't like the vet so he had to be sedated quite a lot, I was a nervous wreck.

"Luckily his leg got better and then they did a skin graft from his back to close the wound, which worked. He is almost back to his normal self now. The fur hasn't completely grown back yet and he is still limping a bit but it is not too bad."

While Mrs Akers is happy Monty got better, she was "absolutely distraught" when the vet told her a car had been involved in his misadventure. She said: "I was raging, I phoned the police. I found out there was no law asking drivers to stop when they run over a cat. I understand that cats can't have the same rights as dogs, as we can't control them as much but I was shocked to hear drivers are not obliged to stop."

Monty's owner is now urging drivers to make attempts to find the cat's owners if an accident happens.

Even though Monty's bills went up to £4,000 ("luckily he is insured" says Mrs Akers) money is not the crux of matter for her.  She just wants to avoid the heartbreak of a cat dying on the side of the road without the owners ever knowing what happened to their beloved pet.

Pictured: "We were lucky Monty made his way back home, but what if he never did?" says Mrs Akers.

Mrs Akers says: "We were lucky Monty made his way back home, but what if he never did? It's obviously not the drivers' fault if the cat runs in front of their car, they are not going to get in trouble. I just wish they would understand a cat is somebody's family member. My cat is my baby, I don't have children and he is a huge personality around the house. People feel like it's not important to report but what kind of person does that without feeling a bit ashamed or some kind of remorse?

"People spend money on looking for their animals, Facebook groups organise search parties. If they die, it would be emotionally easier to get over it, if the family knew what happened, rather than being left to wonder what had happened." 

To help get the law changed and convince drivers to make efforts to help cats after they have been it, Mrs Akers contacted Sandra Jasmins, from the Jersey's Cat Community. Mrs Jasmins has been campaigning since 2015 to protect cats on the roads after her own cat Binky was hit by a car outside her house and left dying in the road. Binky is now recovered but Mrs Jasmins is not giving up the fight. She told Express: "I would like cat lovers to know that we haven’t stop campaigning, we are telling each cats story in hope we can touch driver’s heart so our cats aren’t left to suffer."

Pictured: Mrs Jasmins and Mrs Akers have put together a video on Monty to share his story.

Recently the Jersey's Cat Community shared the heart wrenching story of Danny Aylward, a motorcyclist who saw a car run over a cat on top of Wellington Hill and stopped to help the poor animal.

The man says that he saw the cat, named Ginger, running out from one of the properties in the area and being hit by the front wheels of the car, which didn't have time to slow down. He continued: "I slammed on my brakes and got off my bike as quick as I could, by this time a lady driving on the opposite direction had stopped and got out of her car. We went over to the cat and could see it was fatally wounded. I stood in the middle of the road to prevent any one from hitting the cat, the lady from the blue car gave me the emergency number for the JSPCA which I called.

"As I put the phone down and stood waiting a lady approached me from one of the houses and told me she was the vet at the Animal Shelter. She picked the cat up and moved him out of the road, she then checked over the cat and confirmed that he had died."

The motorcyclist, along with Mrs Akers and Jasmins, are all hoping for a Christmas miracle and for drivers to realise what a difference they can make for the families who own cats by trying to help the animal if an accident happen, "You wouldn't run over somebody's family member and do nothing about it," says Mrs Akers.