Seafood Company Convicted Of Animal Cruelty For Killing Lobster

Is killing a lobster animal cruelty? An Australian seafood company was recently convicted of animal cruelty for doing just that. According to the Guardian, workers at Nicholas Seafoods were seen by investigators "butchering and dismembering lobsters with a band saw, without adequately stunning or killing them." The lobsters also reportedly had their tails cut from their bodies while they were still alive. The legally actionable problem was not actually taking the life of the lobster, but rather that the animals were killed in a way deemed to be unnecessarily, and illegally, brutal. The conviction may be the first of its kind in the world.