Pet-lovers Stewart Montgomery and his girlfriend Agathe Altwegg feel sickened every time they see the distressing images captured on their neighbour’s CCTV camera.
It breaks their hearts to watch their playful nine-month-old cat Hendrix run to a deceptively friendly man who beckons to the animal as he walks down the alley outside the Brighton flat in East Sussex where they used to live.
They can just imagine their affectionate, trusting pet purring loudly as the passerby strokes his black fur, before the cat rolls onto his back to have his tummy tickled.
Beloved pet: Claire Taylor with her cat Merlin who she believes was killed by Steve Bouquet
CCTV footage that caught Steve Bouquet. Without sleuthing, he could still be on the loose
Then, in a matter of seconds, the seemingly innocent scene playing out in front of them turns to horror.
The bald, middle-aged man reaches into his rucksack, raises his hand and, though they can’t make out the knife, makes a stabbing movement towards Hendrix’s belly.
As the fatally injured kitten leaps up and flees, the man casually rearranges his bag and walks away as if nothing has happened.
‘It’s just horrible,’ says Mr Montgomery, 34, adding ‘we’ve wept over it, because it’s such a cold-blooded attack on a defenceless animal, barely nine months old.
‘This wasn’t some maniac spontaneously lashing out at a cat running around, it was a deliberate, malicious act of violence.’
What this couple were witnessing was the notorious ‘Brighton Cat Killer’ in action. Here was the man who’d struck fear into the hearts of the city’s pet-owners for eight months and baffled police.
It was May 2019 when they first saw this disturbing footage, but this week millions more were appalled by it when this crucial piece of evidence was released as the Brighton Cat Killer was finally brought to justice.
And for the first time we can reveal the full story of the role Mr Montgomery and his neighbour Alan Levy — whose family cat Hannah was one of the first of the 16 proven victims — played in helping the police catch him.
Without their sleuthing, he could still be on the loose.
Former security guard and Royal Navy seaman Steve Bouquet, 54, was this week found guilty of the slaying campaign which left nine much-loved pets dead, a further seven injured, and their distraught owners facing vets’ bills running, in some cases, to thousands of pounds.
Bouquet, who denied all the charges, was not in Chichester Crown Court to hear the jury’s guilty verdict, having failed to attend his own trial.
He was found guilty of criminal damage in relation to his attacks, because in law pets are treated as the property of owners.
As well as the CCTV evidence, the court heard how mobile phone data had placed him near the roads where the attacks took place and police had found a knife at his home with cat DNA on it. Photographs of cats, including one dead animal, were also found on his mobile.
His motivation for the attacks remains a mystery.
His Honour Judge Jeremy Gold QC said of the ‘very unpleasant’ attacks: ‘The thought of having a knife plunged into their beloved pet is a serious matter. There will be consequences.’
Bouquet, who had absconded whilst on bail, was apprehended last Monday night after being seen drinking and behaving oddly in a park. He was due to be arrested after doctors had finished assessing his physical and mental state, and is expected to be jailed. A provisional date for sentencing has been set for July 12.
‘Without the CCTV, we wouldn’t have known who it was,’ says Mr Montgomery. ‘The police have done an amazing job bringing him to justice, I can’t fault them, but for eight months they had absolutely no idea who he was.
‘It’s horrible to think that he could still be out there bringing misery to other pet owners, so I’m relieved our evidence helped catch him.
‘It’s so upsetting and I don’t really know what to think about him, but I hope he goes to prison. I can’t believe a man capable of doing this isn’t dangerous.’
Mr Montgomery, who owns a scooter shop, and his French graphic designer girlfriend Miss Altwegg, 33, fell in love with eight-week-old kitten Hendrix in the autumn of 2018, at around the time Bouquet began his knife attacks on the city’s cats — usually carried out at night.
So successful was he at evading capture, he was described in some news reports as almost ‘invisible’.
One of his first known victims was a handsome rescue cat called Alistair, who’d lived with his brother, Duncan, for nine years with owners Stewart Cruse, 73, and his partner of 35 years Philip Noble, 64.
The couple were on holiday in Key West, Florida, in the U.S. when their cat sitter urgently emailed to tell them he’d opened the front door to find Alistair lying on the mat, bleeding with a wound to his neck. The cat sitter had rushed him to the vet, but Mr Cruse and Mr Noble needed to call immediately to give permission to operate.
‘It was all very traumatic and stressful because Alistair and Duncan are our pride and joy,’ Mr Noble told the Mail. ‘Alistair in particular is a very docile, friendly cat who liked to sit on the fence waiting for passers-by to stroke him.
‘I didn’t know what to think. At that stage, all we knew is that he had a deep wound to his neck and it was all very stressful. We thought maybe he’d injured himself on a long nail, or a shard of glass.’
The £2,421 vet’s bill to save Alistair’s life was covered by their pet insurance, but they would have happily paid it themselves to prevent the loss of their adored cat.
‘We were very lucky that Alistair survived, lucky that our cat sitter found him and took him to the vet so quickly, but we only realised he’d been deliberately stabbed when another one of our neighbour’s cats was later stabbed and died. Then another person around the corner’s cat was killed and the police started to link the attacks.
‘We had no idea who could have done this, other than it was someone who had a vendetta against cats, so we were terribly relieved when he was finally caught.
‘This definitely deserves a custodial sentence. If he can do this to cats, what’s the next stage?’
The deaths of Bouquet’s fatally wounded feline victims — Hendrix, Tommy, Alan, Nancy, Gizmo, Kyo, Ollie, Cosmo and Hannah — brought untold misery to their owners, as did the injuries suffered by Alistair, Wheatley, Rigby, Samson, Jasper, Maggie and Gideon, who survived.
The court heard
