A two-year-old girl is mourning the loss of her pet cat after it was punched to death in Porthleven.

Little Freya Boase has been calling out of the window for Pebbles since last week, desperately hoping her pet will return, but to no avail.

The all black cat was brutally beaten to death on Tuesday last week, in Mill Lane, at around 4pm.

It is not known if Pebbles had wandered farther than normal from her home in Thomas Terrace, or was picked up and carried to her death.

Freya’s mum Marney, got Pebbles as a kitten when Freya was just four months old, in order to replicate her own childhood of growing up with a pet.

Marney, 21, said: “They were pretty much the same age and I wanted them to grown up together. The day afterwards Freya was shouting out for hours out of the bedroom window – it was heartbreaking.”

When Marney, who works at Costcutter, initially heard talk in the village about a cat being beaten to death she had no idea that it was her own cat involved.

“She went off for a couple of days and sometimes I didn’t see her, so I didn’t find out until Thursday when a friend told me what happened and it just clicked,” she added.

The whole incident has left Marney feeling shaken. “It’s quite scary,” she said. “For a couple of days I was really shaken up about it all. I’ve got a two-year-old and I was a bit panicky about whether it was about me.

“It’s hard to comprehend; I haven’t got any enemies.”

Pebbles was due to be released by police from the vets yesterday (Tuesday) and will be buried in Marney’s mum’s garden, alongside other family pets.

Police are now hunting for a man who was allegedly seen picking up Pebbles by the scruff of the neck and punching her three or four times.

He has been described as a juvenile, possibly around 16 years old, who was wearing a grey tracksuit and woolly hat, and carrying a bag.

Sergeant Phil Binney, from Helston Police Station, said: “We take these instances very, very seriously and are undertaking all conceivable lines of inquiry in an attempt to identify the offender in this crime and bring him to justice.”

Anyone with information that might help with the inquiry is asked to call police on 101, ref AH/14/455.