A VETERINARY nurse at a private clinic who deliberately poisoned her pet dog in a bizarre case of animal cruelty has been spared jail.

Georgina Bretman, 28, injected her black-andwhite cocker spaniel, Flo, with a drug that made the animal collapse and suffer from convulsions and seizures.

The damage was so severe the two-year-old dog could have ended up in a coma or even dead.

Bretman was convicted, after a trial at Glasgow Sheriff Court, of causing the animal unnecessary suffering in June 2013 by injecting her with insulin.

Although no explanation was offered as to why the vet nurse had harmed her pet, the court was told she was an “attention-seeker”.

Sheriff Joan Kerr found Bretman, of Rhu, Helensburgh, guilty of a charge under the Animal Health and Welfare Act.

Yesterday, Bretman was ordered to 140 hours work as a community payback order as a “direct alternative”

to jail. She was also banned from owning a dog for two years.

Flo has made a full recovery and is now looking for a new home