The 55-year-old instead pleaded guilty to 23 counts of possessing drugs of dependence and scheduled poisons – all used in the sedation of horses.

He was placed on a two-year good behaviour bond without a conviction.

The case, heard in the Bendigo Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday, laid bare the “tensions” between horse veterinarians and lay equine dentists.

It was also a test of the legitimacy of equine dentistry in Australia and the use of specialised power tools to file horses’ teeth, the court was told.

A complaint was lodged against the man after he provided services to a Strathfieldsaye horse owner on August 3 last year.

His work involves the use of rotary cutters imported from the United States where the practice is accepted, and where he completed his training in the early 1990s.

The RSPCA examined the horse and took no further action.

Another vet then inspected the horse on three occasions after the procedure, and reported a loss of weight, discomfort and visible pulp in the incisors. The findings contradicted the independent examination from the RSPCA.

The matter was taken to police, who raided the man’s property on January 8 and charged him with two counts of animal cruelty, along with the possession charges.

Defence counsel Belinda Franjic said the man had worked as a lay equine dentist for 30 years without a recorded complaint against him.

She said he was also facing a civil suit from the same customer.

Magistrate Franz Holzer was unconvinced with the prosecution case, and believed the RSPCA would have been heavily involved if the injuries to the horse constituted animal cruelty.

“I don’t sense that there was great cruelty, or the RSPCA would be all over it,” he said.

The prosecution tendered a number of statements from specialist dentists, but few saw the horse in question and instead argued against the practice in principle, the court was told.

Ms Franjic tendered 50 statements in support of the man from former customers. She said he had even been employed by Victoria Police between 2008 and 2009 to provide dental work on police horses.

Mr Holzer said it appeared the case was an attempt to outlaw the practice.

“I am concerned whether we can prove the charge beyond reasonable doubt. There’s an element of protectionism in all of this,” he said.

The court heard the man has stopped using his own horse sedatives since the raid.