RCVS News: Disciplinary Committee Dismisses Case against Kent Vet

RCVS News: Disciplinary Committee Dismisses Case against Kent Vet PR Newswire LONDON, May 31, 2012 LONDON, May 31, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- The Disciplinary Committee of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS) last week [24 May 2012] dismissed a case against a Kent veterinary surgeon convicted of tail-docking and also charged with misleadingly altering an owner's record relating to tail dockings. At the outset of the four-day hearing, David Smith, of Lakeview Veterinary Centre, Deal, admitted he had been convicted of an offence of tail docking on 14 December 2010 at the Channel Magistrates Court. He said that, in 2008, he had misinterpreted the legislation about tail docking and as a result had removed the tails of a litter of 13 Rottweiler puppies. He was subsequently convicted of illegal docking. Mr Smith also accepted he had altered the owner's record, at the owner's request, when the RSPCA were investigating the circumstances of the docking by adding the words "for law enforcement", but maintained this alteration was to clarify the record to which he had initially added the words "for security selection"; he denied any attempt to mislead, or that he ought to have known it may mislead.