A Mangotsfield family are devastated after their beloved cat was killed with an arrow.
Christine McFarlane says her five-year-old tomcat Loki was fatally shot with a crossbow between 6am and 6.30am last Thursday (April 29), in the Royal Road and Streamside area.
The 61-year-old said: "I could hear the cat outside the door at 6.30am on Thursday, and I couldn't understand why he hadn't come through the cat flap, until I opened the door and there he was.
"He had been trying to get through the cat flap. There was blood everywhere. There was an arrow, about 12 to 14 inches, and black with white plastic feathers. It had gone in one side, and the metal tip was coming out of his stomach.
"Loki was still alive. He fought right to the end. I phoned my husband and we managed to get him in a small dog crate and to the emergency vets in Bradley Stoke.
"We couldn't believe he had stayed alive. We kept looking at him and he was looking at us. It was awful. The vets made the decision to put him down because to remove the arrow would cause more damage. They phoned us in the afternoon to say he had gone."
Christine, a home care worker who has worked throughout the pandemic, added her three daughters and six young grandchildren are heartbroken.
"It's just awful," she said. "It's so frightening. I've got a dog, and I'm now frightened to let him out unless I'm with him.
"There's no reason there should be a vendetta attack on our family. That doesn't make sense. I'm in my 60s, a bit old for anything like that.
"Not knowing who did it is the worst thing, and the fact it's happened so close to home. Everyone knew Loki in the street. They all had their own names for him. People used to call him the King of the Road, the way he used to swagger."
Christine's neighbour saw Loki uninjured in their back garden at 6am last Thursday, leading the family to believe the attack happened in the following half an hour.
"What we're struggling with is it seems to have almost happened in the back garden or on the back of our carport, very close to home. That's where the blood is, all the way down the garden.
"We walked round Royal Road looking for any trails, and people were lovely, letting us look in their gardens, but the trail seemed to start in our back garden. We're assuming he was shot while sat on our shed roof.
"He couldn't have got far because the arrow had pretty much knocked every organ. He had liver, lung and bowel damage. He was barely able to walk."
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The grandmother has never seen a crossbow in the area. No licence or registration is required to own one in the UK. Christine believes the law should be changed to ensure police know where such weapons are held.
She called on anyone with information to come forward, adding: "Someone must know if there's a person with a crossbow in the area."
An Avon and Somerset police spokesman said the force is investigating the attack. Anyone with information that could assist police enquiries is asked to call 101 and give reference number 5221092158.
