A MAN who kept a mini zoo of snakes, scorpions, turtles and lizards in his one-bedroom flat has been sentenced to prison.
Keith Ross has been jailed for 18 months for keeping a dangerous collection of animals, most of which were neglected and treated horrendously.
He has also been given a 10-year disqualification on keeping animals.
His bizarre collection included a king cobra, said to be the world’s largest poisonous snake, as well as vipers and a rattlesnake.
One snake was a boomslang, which, says a science website, has a bite that “makes you bleed from every orifice until you die”.
The forklift driver collected the creatures for six years and even displayed them at children’s parties, charging around £80 an hour.
But police, animal welfare officers and council staff raided the 27-year-old’s home in Motherwell, North Lanarkshire, following an anonymous tip-off.
He admitted 18 charges when he appeared at Hamilton Sheriff Court in January of this year.
An inspector from SSPCA’s Special Investigations Unit, said: “Ross had a collection of reptiles in his home unlike anything we have seen before.”
Welfare officers found that the animals, had been neglected by Ross.
Ross admitted eight charges of neglect and nine of keeping “dangerous and wild animals” without a licence from North Lanarkshire Council.
All the animals are now being cared for by specialist handlers.
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