Tribune file photo of a random goat

A bill to make bestiality a crime in Florida is slated to be heard by a state Senate committee Wednesday afternoon.

Senate Bill 744, Relating to Sexual Activities Involving Animals, was filed by Sen. Nan Rich, D-Sunrise.

The bill would prevent anyone from knowingly committing bestiality, knowingly causing or aiding another person to have sex with an animal, or knowingly permitting sex with an animal at a property under his control.

The bestiality bill was pitched at the behest of the Panhandle Animal Welfare Society, or PAWS, Rich said.

Last year, a Walton County man raped a pregnant goat, killing it and the twins inside it, said Dee Thompson-Poirrier of Okaloosa County Animal Services with PAWS. After the incident, Thompson-Poirrier learned the only Florida statute the man had violated was killing the goat.

“If it lived, there wouldn’t have been any law violated whatsoever,” she said earlier this year.

Rich, who doesn’t own a pet, said it’s important to outlaw sexual conduct and sexual contact with animals.

Sexual conduct means touching or fondling – either directly or through clothing – of an animal’s sexual organs or anus for the purpose of a person’s sexual gratification, the bill states.

Sexual contact means “contact, however slight, between the mouth, sex organ, or anus of a person and the sex organ or anus of an animal, or any penetration, however slight, of any part of the body of the person into the sex organ or anus of an animal, or any penetration of the sex organ or anus of the person into the mouth of the animal,” for a person’s gratification, according to the bill.

The bill includes anyone who “knowingly engages in organizing, promoting, conducting, advertising, aiding, abetting, participating in as an observer, or performing any service” to further the act of bestiality.

People also aren’t allowed to photograph or film animal sex for the purpose of sexual gratification, or sell or transmit images of animal sex, according to the bill.

If the bill becomes law, having sex with an animal would result in a harsher penalty than committing an act to animal that results in that animal’s “cruel death, or excessive or repeated infliction of unnecessary pain or suffering.”

Click here for more information on animals and criminals.

Click here for more information on goats.

Reporter Josh Poltilove can be reached at jpoltilove@tampatrib.com or (813) 259-7691. Follow crime throughout the day at Keyword: Crime Blog

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