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A former football player has been banned from owning cattle for 10 years after he pleaded guilty to 72 charges of animal cruelty and neglect.
Joseph Dare, 33, joined the Carlton Football Club during the 2010 Rookie Draft but would never make a first-grade appearance for the club.
The dairy farmer, who lives in Victoria, was convicted and was also fined $75,000 for the offences, which were described by Magistrate Franz Holzer as ‘one of the worst examples of animal neglect that I have seen’.
A well-known footballer among the Victorian local leagues, Dare had first faced 33 charges of animal cruelty in September. Further charges came in April, with 13 aggravated animal cruelty offences and 16 animal cruelty charges for alleged offending being made against the ex-footballer.
The incidents were said to have occurred between July 2022 and January 2024.
The Colac Magistrates Court heard accounts of how livestock had both suffered and died on his Dreeite farm.
Former football player, Joe Dare, has been banned from owning cattle for 10 years after he pleaded guilty to 72 charges of animal cruelty and neglect
Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action prosecutor Scott Ward told the court that his farm had been visited by officers from Agriculture Victoria on multiple occasions during that period.
He presented photographs to the court, while detailing graphic incidents where cattle had suffered or died on Dare’s farm.
The charges levied included allegations that Dare had not provided appropriate care, treatment or attention to the animals and had also failed to provide his livestock with sufficient food.
Ward explained that cattle were found to have body score conditions of 0-1. Some of the animals were suffering from issues including lung disease, pneumonia, starvation, dehydration and trauma.
Speaking to the court, he said one officer had described the cows as ‘walking skeletons and still had calves suckling from them.’
Officers found a total of 170 animals on the farm, however, 45 had to be euthanised.
Dare was charged with in relation to breaches of Victoria’s Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act 1986.
During sentencing, Magistrate Holzer described Dare’s farm as ‘animal killing fields’.
Dare, 33, joined the Carlton Football Club during the 2010 Rookie Draft but would never make a first-grade appearance for the club
‘He got animals that were unwell and then neglected them even further … that's just shameful, shameful,’ the magistrate explained.
After leaving Carlton, Dare, who is the son of a dairy farmer, moved to play football for the Northern Bullants in 2011 and again moved to Cobden in 2012.
After hanging up his footy boots, Dare took up a coaching role at Alvie, going on to help the side win a premiership.
Dare told police that his business had grown from 200 milking cows to 2,000, the court was told. He had just one farmhand after losing multiple members of staff back in 2023.
But Magistrate Holzer believed that his background in farming should have meant that Dare was better able to care for his animals.
‘It’s such a significant departure from the standards expected,’ Holzer added.
‘He was growing his business too quickly, he didn’t have the financial capacity … It seems to me he was out of his depth, well and truly.’
Dare had been farming in the Nalangil district, 15km from Colac.
