Man admits to killing three cats, dumping two under bridge

A Winnipeg man whose arrest last year sparked outrage in the city’s animal-welfare community has admitted to strangling three cats to death and dumping two of their carcasses under a bridge.

Randy Jensen, 25, pleaded guilty Wednesday to one count of wilfully causing suffering or injury to the animals in December 2024.

Court heard Jensen was in the area of his home in west Winnipeg when he approached one cat, motioning as if to pet it, when he grabbed the animal and choked it to death.

On another occasion, Jensen was driving near his home when he lured a cat into his car with a cat treat. Jensen bound the cat’s paws with duct tape and strangled it with an electrical cord.

On a third occasion, Jensen responded to a Kijiji ad posted by Rejeana McIvor, who was seeking to rehome her two cats, Nami and Nero. Jensen choked one of the cats at his home that same day.

Jensen disposed of two of the animals underneath the Summit Road bridge, not far from his home. Court heard an area resident was out for a walk Dec. 27 when he saw a dead cat under the bridge and assumed it had been killed by an animal. The man discovered a second cat under the bridge a day later and called police.

“I’m aware you don’t fully recall these incidents, nevertheless… you accept that is true?” defence lawyer Brett Gladstone asked Jensen before provincial court Judge Heather Pullan accepted his plea.

“Yes,” Jensen said.

He will be sentenced at a later date following the completion of a court-ordered pre-sentence report.

Court heard Jensen’s “emotional and psychiatric status” was raised with police during a video interview recorded after his arrest.

“It is a special area of the pre-sentence report that I would ask probation services to pay special attention to,” Gladstone told Pullan.

McIvor said she wants Jensen to be sent to jail.

“I feel like if he just gets a slap on the wrist, then it won’t deter others from harming animals,” she said Wednesday evening.

McIvor said she thinks of the two cats every day and said even hearing about attacks and the guilty plea has been hard.

“When I rehomed them, I didn’t want to just rehome them and then forget about them,” she said. “Ever since then, I think about them every day. Me and my family miss them every day.”

She feels even though a guilty plea has been entered, Jensen is not remorseful, saying any tears he may have shed through the court process, were “tears for himself.”

McIvor said she’s set to meet with the Crown prosecutor in June.

She said when it comes to her beloved cats, she wants to see justice, which means harsher punishments for people who commit this type of abuse.

The Winnipeg Humane Society has reported a rise in cases of violence against domestic animals.

In February, Irene Lima and Chad Kabecz were each sentenced to 12 years in prison after admitting to torturing and killing dozens of cats and other small animals for an online paying audience.

Lima, 56, crushed the animals to death with her bare feet, while 41-year-old Kabecz recorded the killings, videos of which were shared with paying customers via a chat group where Lima was known as “Goddess May.”

– with files from Morgan Modjeski

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca