A POSTMAN who arranged for four Jack Russell puppies to have their tails docked has been banned from keeping animals for two years.

Andrew Anthony Bennett, 43, of Church Street, Ribchester, pleaded guilty to causing the removal of part of a dog’s tail.

Hyndburn magistrates accepted that he didn’t personally inflict the ‘pain and suffering’ to the two-day old dogs.

But the court heard that Bennett was ‘the man in the know’ and had been present on March 23 when the tails of the dogs had been cut with a knife.

RSPCA Inspector Amanda Barr had investigated an allegation the two male and two female dogs, belonging to a couple from Water Street, Ribchester, had their tails docked - an illegal activity.

The couple claimed they weren’t aware that docking was illegal and were both dealt with by way of adult cautions.

However, they revealed that they asked Bennett, who they had met in a pub years earlier, about docking the puppies’ tails and he had arranged for a man called ‘Dave’ from Clitheroe to visit their home and carry it out. ‘Dave’ has never been traced.

Bennett told the RSPCA that if he had known docking was illegal he ‘wouldn’t have got involved’.

The court heard there was ‘no financial motive’ for Bennett to organise the docking, but that his parents had sold the couple the dogs’ mother, which then gave birth to the four pups.

The Royal Mail employee of 12 years, who had no previous convictions, was told to pay £1,000 costs.