The Helsinki police have started a preliminary investigation, where it is suspected that a 24-year-old man transported 32 dogs to the ground under bad conditions.
According to the police, the mode of transport, a small truck, caused unnecessary pain and suffering to the animals.
The Border Guard notified the Helsinki police on Saturday that a vehicle with a large number of dogs had arrived at the city’s harbor on a ferry from Tallinn. The police said they found 32 dogs in the vehicle, seven of which had died during the trip.
Detective Inspector Crista Granroth reported that the suspect was transporting the dogs in a truck that was not intended for transporting animals.
"The vehicle’s air conditioning was insufficient and, according to current information, the conditions were in no case suitable for transporting animals," Granroth said in a statement.
The police suspect that the driver had taken the animals from a zoo in Moscow, Russia, to Finland via Lithuania and Estonia. The police said they intend to find out the origin of the dogs and their legal status before they arrive in Finland.
Three of the dogs were in such poor condition when they arrived that the authorities decided they had to be euthanized.
At the same time, three other dogs were still being treated at the animal hospital of the University of Helsinki on Monday, two of them in critical condition.
Source: The Nordic Page