Cat's not right! Judges hit back in UK pet spat

British judges insist they didn't block a criminal's deportation because of worries he'd be separated from his pet cat.

Home Secretary Theresa May on Tuesday told an annual rally of Britain's governing Conservative Party that a court had ruled a Bolivian man should be allowed to stay in the U.K., in part because he owned a cat.

She was citing examples of human rights legislation preventing the country's courts from sending foreign offenders home.

The Judicial Office, which represents judges, insisted May was wrong. It said the man was allowed to stay because of a long term relationship with his girlfriend, a British resident.

In the court's ruling, Judge Judith Gleeson had joked that the couple's cat wouldn't have "to adapt to Bolivian mice."

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