Man faces jail for using cat to attack police officer

Alleged use of a feline in assault in Moscow leaves sergeant with claw marks on face

The cat allegedly scratched a police sergeant during a house call in October 2018 (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

A Russian man is facing up to five years in prison for allegedly thrusting a cat into the face a police officer.

Gennady Shcherbakov, 59, allegedly used the animal as a weapon after being told to stop disturbing residents at a house in Moscow.

He picked it up between the shoulder blades, causing the cat to become aggressive and release its claws, and then pushed it up into the face of sergeant VA Tkachev, according to the official summons.

The officer reportedly suffered ”physical pain, moral harm and multiple scratches on the left side of his face”.

Mr Shcherbakov, who was arrested and spent the night in the cells, claimed the cat jumped on the officer of its own accord.

The officer initially chose not to launch criminal proceedings after the attack on 4 October last year, according to Russian media reports.

However criminal proceedings were launched last week by the Investigative Committee, Russia’s anti-corruption agency.

A former prosecutor told the alternative media website Mediazona the case was only opened “to blame the district prosecutor for poor supervision of the investigation”.

Mr Shcherbakov is now facing a charge of using violence against a representative of the authorities under article 318 of the criminal code, an offence which carries a maximum sentence of five years imprisonment or a fine of 200,000 rubles (£2,400).

The incident was first reported on the Baza Telegram channel on Wednesday.

It claimed that the suspect was drunk and “making a loud noise” in a stairwell of an apartment building in the Biryulyovo district.

“He grabbed the cat like a suitcase and shook it,” Baza claimed. “The cat freaked out, released its claws, and then Gennady poked it in the face of the policeman.”

The cat in question has since died, according to the prosecutor who spoke to Mediazona.