The young couple who left them to their fate have now been banned from keeping animals for life.

A photograph taken by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals would prove too distressing to readers if it were published.
The RSPCA today condemned the couple after two of the dogs, which were near to death, were forced to eat their room-mate to survive.

The severely undernourished dogs, a white lurcher cross and Jack Russell known as Rex and Jake, were on the point of death when they were found after emergency services were called to a fire at Noble Street, Hendon.

Both dogs were discovered, filthy and with protruding bones, in a blood-smeared kitchen. Police officers also found the remains of another Jack Russell.

A vet's examination revealed Rex and Jake were so hungry they had eaten the other dog, called Sam, but it could not be established how it had died.

The dogs' owners and former partners Jean-Marie Child and Kelvin Thomas Stubbs, blamed each other for the animals' plight, denying separate charges of animal cruelty.

They appeared for sentence before Sunderland magistrates yesterday, when they were each banned from keeping animals for life and given a community order and a supervision order for 12 months.

Child, 18, was also subjected to an 8pm to 8am curfew with electronic tagging, while Stubbs, 21, now of Nursery Park, Ashington, was ordered to do 180 hours unpaid work over 12 months.

The magistrates told them to pay £500 costs each and awarded costs of £1,561 for veterinary and other expenses.

The court also ordered both surviving animals to be transferred to the legal custody of the RSPCA.

Announcing the sentence, the chairman of the bench, Alan Lemarinel, told them: "We heard the extent of the suffering of these animals. You definitely caused the death of one animal and extreme suffering to two others."

Afterwards, RSPCA inspector Emma Ellis described it as one of the worst cases that could be imagined, with two dogs having to eat another to barely survive.

At an earlier hearing, the court was told that the couple had lived at Noble Street for about nine months, but after they split both claimed the other had moved out, leaving their ex-partner to care for the animals.

Prosecutor Clive McKeag said RSPCA inspectors visited the house on 13 occasions but were unable to get in.

"What is undoubtable is that all three dogs were undernourished, emaciated and the two living dogs fed off the carcass of the other dog to keep themselves alive.

"There was difficulties between the parties, but that is no concern of the RSPCA. It is their duty to make sure the animals are looked after."

Magistrates heard how Child, now living in a hostel in Middlesbrough, had been admitted to Cherry Knowle hospital after the fire at the property on April 3 last year.

She had spent three weeks there after being sectioned under Mental Health Act.

Child's solicitor, Lucy Shuttleworth, said yesterday that she had a mental health problem that raised its head when the incident came to light.

Stubb's solicitor, Laura Turner, said her client was "genuinely sorry" about what had happened.