BANGOR – A motorist driving down State Street in Bangor on Friday stopped to rescue a kitten from a group of juveniles who had been kicking it, although the kitten died as the man was bringing it to the local humane society.

“This was really sick,” Rochelle Black, adoption and volunteer services manager for the Bangor Humane Society, said Friday about what had happened to the kitten. She said the animal appeared to be about four months old. In addition to being beaten, the kitten had been burned.

The rescuer was heading to an appointment shortly before noontime when he spotted a group of youths kicking what he initially thought was a hacky sack. The man quickly realized that it was something else and intervened, taking the kitten from the juveniles and driving to the Bangor Humane Society on Mount Hope Avenue.

The kitten had been alive on the way but was dead by the time it arrived at the humane society, Black was told.

Black has been with the animal welfare organization for more than six years, and she has seen cases where animals are in ill health or malnourished because of neglect or out of ignorance, but nothing like this.

“Nothing as downright cruel as this,” she said.

Bangor police Sgt. Bob Bishop said such incidents are “very rare in this city.”

Bishop wouldn’t comment specifically about the cruelty done to the kitten, but Black said the kitten’s paws had been burned as well as its eyes.

A Bangor police officer is investigating the incident and a detective has been assigned to it as well, Bishop said.

The sergeant said he is confident that those who did this will be found and will be held accountable.

“Certainly everyone involved will face criminal charges,” he said.

Black said that the kitten likely was someone’s pet, as opposed to a stray, as it had been well-groomed and appeared well-fed.

She credited both the man for intervening and the police for their active investigation into the case.

Black said that animal abuse is more common than many suspect.

“This stuff happens in your backyard whether you want to believe it or not,” she said. “It doesn’t just happen on ‘Animal Planet.'”

Anyone with information can contact the police at 947-7384.