EUR: Journalist on trial for killing fish with shampoo
16 May 2009 3:04 AM
COPENHAGEN, May 15 AFP - A Danish journalist is to go on trial next week for killing 12 guppy fish with shampoo live on television.
Lisbeth Kloester, a television presenter on the Danish public channel DV1, said she poured a "very diluted" amount of shampoo into a fish tank on a 2004 episode of the consumer affairs show she fronted to demonstrate the level of toxic material in a brand of anti-dandruff shampoo.
"After four days all but one of the fish were dead," Kloester told AFP.
But a veterinary practioner who saw the show pressed charges for causing unnecessary suffering to animals, an offence under Danish law.
Kloester pleaded not guilty and her lawyer Tyge Trier told AFP he expected his client to be acquitted at the trial on Tuesday.
"The allegations are this experiment caused the fish's fear and suffering...but expert witnesses told the court on May 12 that this was not the case," he said.
"Fish are killed by suffocation in industrial fisheries and we throw live lobsters into boiling water, but we don't press charges against fisherman or restaurant owners," Trier added.
Kloester could face a fine if found guilty.
