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Legal and Illegal Theriocide of Trafficked Animals 463 brief suspended prison sentence (The failure of such punishment in serving as a deterrent and in creating awareness will not be discussed in this chapter, but see Sollund and Maher 2015; Sollund 2013a, 2015b) It is striking, however, that while the trafficker receives a small fine, the fate of the majority of the animals involved is death Before I turn to this outcome, the logic behind it, the explanations for it and the species injustice thereby perpetuated, I will address briefly the abuses the animals suffer before they reach their endpoint Abuse Through Trafficking Despite the legality and regulation of much animal trafficking, the ways in which animals are trafficked and the conditions in which they live are often characterized by abuse I take my understanding of animal abuse from the definition laid out by Robert Agnew (1998, p 179) and specified by Piers Beirne […] any act that contributes to the pain, suffering or death of an animal or that otherwise threatens its welfare Animal abuse may be physical, psychological, or emotional; may involve active maltreatment or passive neglect or omission; and may be direct or indirect, intentional or unintentional (Beirne 1999 p 121) Normally, when animals are taken from their habitats for the pet trade, or when they are bred for that purpose, there is no intention to abuse them Unfortunately, abuse often occurs As mentioned above, deaths are widespread among birds and reptiles, and the ways in which they die—from suffocation, starvation, dehydration, and shock and pain—are clearly causing them great harm and suffering For example, one of our interviewees in South America described an incident in which locals were abducting and trafficking parrots When they came upon a police control, and as they were near water, they simply submerged the cage with the birds to prevent them from screaming It is unknown how many of the birds died as a result of this Recently, in Indonesia, cockatoos were smuggled in bottles and only a few survived (Awford 2015) An interviewee from Colombia provided another example: For the birds they use PVC tubes where they stuff the birds, they are thus totally immobilized, they can traffic 1000 birds in this way, of which 10 to 15 percent may survive, which is sufficient to produce profit (Proaves, translated from Spanish)