Animal Cruelty Laws by State

Fla. Stat. Ann. § 828

Animals: Cruelty; Sales; Animal Enterprise Protection

Fla. Stat. Ann. § 828.12. Cruelty to Animals

Fla. Stat. Ann. § 828.13 Confinement of animals without sufficient food, water, or exercise; abandonment of animals

No definition of “animal” in the criminal statutes.

Minimum standard of care: Every owner, driver, or keeper of any animal who permits the animal to be in any building, enclosure, lane, street, square, or lot of any city, county, city and county, or judicial district without proper care and attention is guilty of a misdemeanor. Cal. Penal Code § 597.1.

Cruelty:

(a) Except as provided in subdivision (c) of this section or Section 599c [see EXEMPTIONS on the right], every person who maliciously and intentionally maims, mutilates, tortures, or wounds a living animal, or maliciously and intentionally kills an animal, is guilty of a crime punishable pursuant to subdivision (d).

(b) Except as otherwise provided in subdivision (a) or (c), every person who overdrives, overloads, drives when overloaded, overworks, tortures, torments, deprives of necessary sustenance, drink, or shelter, cruelly beats, mutilates, or cruelly kills any animal, or causes or procures any animal to be so overdriven, overloaded, driven when overloaded, overworked, tortured, tormented, deprived of necessary sustenance, drink, shelter, or to be cruelly beaten, mutilated, or cruelly killed; and whoever, having the charge or custody of any animal, either as owner or otherwise, subjects any animal to needless suffering, or inflicts unnecessary cruelty upon the animal, or in any manner abuses any animal, or fails to provide the animal with proper food, drink, or shelter or protection from the weather, or who drives, rides, or otherwise uses the animal when unfit for labor, is, for each offense, guilty of a crime punishable pursuant to subdivision (d). Cal. Penal Code § 597.

Failure to care:

Every owner, driver, or keeper of any animal who permits the animal to be in any building, enclosure, lane, street, square, or lot of any city, county, city and county, or judicial district without proper care and attention is guilty of a misdemeanor. Cal. Penal Code § 597.1.

Care for impounded animals:

Any person who impounds, or causes to be impounded in any animal shelter, any domestic animal, shall supply it during confinement with a sufficient quantity of good and wholesome food and water, and in default thereof, is guilty of a misdemeanor. In case any domestic animal is at any time so impounded and continues to be without necessary food and water for more than 12 consecutive hours, it is lawful for any person, from time to time, as may be deemed necessary, to enter into and upon any animal shelter in which the animal is confined, and supply it with necessary food and water so long as it remains so confined.

Cal. Penal Code § 597e.

No part of this title shall be construed as interfering with any of the laws of this state known as the “game laws,” or any laws for or against the destruction of certain birds, nor must this title be construed as interfering with the right to destroy any venomous reptile, or any animal known as dangerous to life, limb, or property, or to interfere with the right to kill all animals used for food, or with properly conducted scientific experiments or investigations performed under the authority of the faculty of a regularly incorporated medical college or university of this state. Cal. Penal Code § 599c.

Any peace officer, humane society officer, or animal control officer shall take possession of the stray or abandoned animal and shall provide care and treatment for the animal until the animal is deemed to be in suitable condition to be returned to the owner. When the officer has reasonable grounds to believe that very prompt action is required to protect the health or safety of the animal or the health or safety of others, the officer shall immediately seize the animal and comply with subdivision (f). In all other cases, the officer shall comply with the provisions of subdivision (g). Cal. Penal Code § 597.1.

It shall be the duty of all peace officers, humane society officers, and animal control officers to cause the animal to be humanely euthanized or rehabilitated and placed in a suitable home on information that the animal is stray or abandoned. . . . When the officer has reasonable grounds to believe that very prompt action is required to protect the health or safety of an animal or the health or safety of others, the officer shall immediately seize the animal and comply with subdivision (f) [Whenever an officer authorized under this section seizes or impounds an animal based on a reasonable belief that prompt action is required to protect the health or safety of the animal or the health or safety of others]. In all other cases, the officer shall comply with subdivision (g) [Where the need for immediate seizure is not present] . . . . Any peace officer, humane society officer, or animal control officer shall convey all injured cats and dogs found without their owners in a public place directly to a veterinarian known by the officer to be a veterinarian who ordinarily treats dogs and cats for a determination of whether the animal shall be immediately and humanely euthanized or shall be hospitalized under proper care and given emergency treatment. Cal. Penal Code § 597.1.

An animal control agency that takes possession of an animal pursuant to subdivision (c) shall keep records of the whereabouts of the animal from the time of possession to the end of the animal’s impoundment, and those records shall be available for inspection by the public upon request for three years after the date the animal’s impoundment ended. Cal. Penal Code § 597.1.