A FATHER and son have received prison sentences for keeping greyhounds in conditions a judge said resembled a concentration camp.

The 11 dogs at Woodside Kennels, Tiptree, were found without food, water or fresh air and some were kept in the dark, Colchester Magistrates’ Court heard.

Lynne Shirley, prosecuting for the RSPCA, which spent £20,000 on the rescue and investigation, said every kennel was covered in excrement and urine and the smell of ammonia was so strong, the dogs had sore eyes.

All the greyhounds were underweight and had been suffering for some time, some mentally as well as physically. The court watched a DVD showing one dog running round in circles in its pen.

Robert Freeman, 19, was locked up for 90 days at a young offenders’ institution. His father, John Freeman, also received a 90-day jail term, suspended for a year, for allowing the dogs to suffer.

He had left his son in charge of the kennels while he stayed at home in Wales.

The court heard inspectors from the National Greyhound Racing Club (NGRC) had first visited the kennels in February last year and warned the pair to clean up.

Conditions improved temporarily but deteriorated again throughout the following month until the club’s final inspection on March 17.

Mrs Shirley said Irene Haselwood, of the NGRC, said she had never seen a situation so upsetting and unnecessary.

Rebecca Wastall, mitigating, said John Freeman, a former railway worker, had run a successful greyhound racing business from a smallholding in Wales for years, but had moved the kennels to Tiptree after his land was repossessed.

She said Robert, of Mansfield Street, Swansea, who also worked shifts on the railways, had been struggling to manage the kennels since his father fell ill in January.

She added: “It was a short period of time in which they were at their worst.”

District judge David Cooper said: “Looking at the place you kept those greyhounds, it wasn’t so much kennels as a concentration camp. It’s just appalling.

“One dog had to turn and turn in this heartbreaking fashion.

“There was heedless neglect and cruelty to numerous animals, despite warnings.”

Judge Cooper ordered John Freeman, 52, of Dyffryn Road, Saron Ammanford, to pay £500 in costs and £2,000 towards the RSPCA’s £20,000 bill. Both father and son were also banned from keeping pets for ten years, with the exception of two greyhounds, a cat and a parrot which belong to John Freeman’s wife.