A 24-year-old man was fined $500 and banned from owning a dog for the next 12 months after he failed to provide his injured dog with care.

Kumi Hartford, of Mission Lane, Paget was charged with cruelty in Magistrates' Court yesterday after he failed to provide the animal in his care with medical attention.

Crown counsel Graveney Bannister told the court that dog wardens went to Hartford's home where they found the dog injured with wounds to its face and legs. Mr. Bannister said that some of the wounds had puss oozing out of them.

When Magistrate Will Francis asked if he had anything to say, Hartford replied: "I came home that night because I work late. Another dog came into my yard and attacked my dog. I was going to take him to the vet the next day."

Hartford said that he tried to clean the dog up as best he could. But when morning came he went to work and when he returned home he found that his dog had been confiscated.

"Work comes first," an unrepentant Hartford told the court.

Mr. Bannister asked that Hartford be banned from owning any dogs for a year, adding that the injuries to the dog were "extensive".

And when Mr. Bannister told the defendant that he had obligations to the animal, Hartford replied: "You guys have got to get your side straight. As a matter of fact they can have the dog because I don't want that round my yard."