DMN Story on DAS Handling of Animal Cruelty Cases

[Guest guest]

Sorry to all for being out of the loop for the last month or so. I'm way past snowed under with my job and more than tired from working for Jenny for many months at a time (although I'm not giving up).

 

But, I read this DMN story (see below link) and the situation described is intolerable. We must let the City of Dallas know that the community is severely disappointed regarding Dallas' lack of enforcement of the law to protect animals and we want the anti-animal cruelty law enforced in all instances immediately.

 

The City of Dallas' Animal Services flagrant disregard for the law and animal cruelty must not go unchallenged. Please direct your comments to the City of Dallas Council members and City Manager.

 

City of Dallas contact information is as follows:

Dallas City Manager, Mary Suhm may be reached by phoning her aassistants, Juanita Tovar (214) 670-1858 or Gerard Camacho (214) 670-4549

 

Dallas City Council: http://www.dallascityhall.com/government/council/contact_mcc.html

 

If you have one extra minute, please also thank the DMN reporter, Rudy Busch (rbush), for writing the story.

 

Thanks to Beverly for letting us know about this, and to all who call and email. Margaret-

 

 

 

Beverly Fyfe

Sunday, July 05, 2009 8:19 AM

Fw: DMN Story on DAS Handling of Animal Cruelty cases

 

 

 

 

Below is a story that’s in Sunday’s Dallas Morning News on Dallas Animal Services’ handling of the recent cruelty case involving the 27 dogs that were recently returned to the owner. There’s an accompanying video online, and that link is below. WARNING - some of it is hard to watch if you prefer to skip it. Beverly Fyfe

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

July 4, 2009

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you like this video please return to http://www.dallasnews.com/video/to see more!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dallas beefs up on fighting animal cruelty, but critics want more action

10:53 PM CDT on Saturday, July 4, 2009

By RUDOLPH BUSH / The Dallas Morning News rbush

Dallas City Hall has spent millions of dollars building a new animal shelter and enhancing its animal services staff even as it has strengthened ordinances aimed at curbing cruelty and targeting irresponsible pet owners.

 

But some of the city's top animal-welfare advocates say Dallas still comes up short when dealing with allegations of cruelty and neglect.

 

That charge was heightened by a June incident that saw the city return 27 dogs to a man who advocates say starved the animals and kept them in fetid conditions.

 

City Hall has since launched an internal investigation into how top members of the animal services department, including animal shelter manager Kent Robertson and a staff veterinarian, handled what advocates describe as an egregious case of cruelty.

 

"Obviously, something went wrong here. It's hard to imagine the dogs ... wouldn't have been seized and kept from the owner. They had open wounds. The conditions they were kept in were pretty horrible," said Skip Trimble, chairman of the city's animal shelter commission.

 

The incident referred to by Trimble took place June 10, when animal services officers visited a property on Cotton Lane in southern Dallas and found 28 living dogs mingling among the decaying remains of at least two dead ones. More than a few of the living animals were showing ribs and had bleeding sores.

The city impounded the dogs overnight June 10, euthanized one and gave the rest rabies shots.

On June 11, the dogs were released to Randall Day, who told animal services officers that he was their owner.

 

In an interview, Day said he was caring for the dogs the best he could after the death of his father. He said he has since moved the animals to a property in Kaufman County .

 

Given the condition of the animals, Trimble and others doubt Day was giving them much care at all.

But their main concern revolved around the city's actions in the case.

The dogs were returned to Day despite their condition and without requiring him to register or microchip them as required under city ordinance. Day also paid no fees for having any of the dogs spayed or neutered, or for a permit to keep them intact.

It is unclear whether the animals had been spayed or neutered before being taken into the city's custody.

What is clear, though, is that a number of fees – likely amounting to thousands of dollars – should have been paid before the dogs were released.

"If in fact they let these animals out and did not follow our ordinances, that's unacceptable," Trimble said.

Assistant City Manager Forest Turner, who oversees animal services, said he is troubled by some of the details that have emerged in the case and has launched an investigation by the city's human resources department.

But he defended the city's animal services department as an operation that continues to improve thanks to stronger ordinances and the opening of the shelter in late 2007.

"I've seen the people who work out there [at the animal shelter], and they care," Turner said.

Animal-welfare advocates say the city's new shelter has been a blessing. But they wonder whether the city is being aggressive enough when it comes to pursuing cruelty charges.

Nili Asgharian, a member of the Dallas Animal Cruelty Alliance, said she has informed the city about a number of cruelty cases over the years, only to see little response.

In a case involving a pit bull breeder in West Dallas , Asgharian said members of her organization observed months of cruel treatment and pushed animal services constantly to file charges, only to see the city advise the owner to put up a privacy fence.

According to the city, the fence was recommended to the owner as a way to get dogs off chains and leashes – the main cruelty complaint.

But Asgharian saw it as a way to get around filing charges and pointed out that the owner already had a chain-link fence.

" Dallas animal services is run with taxpayer money, and more often than not, they are failing to do their job," she said.

Trimble said he, too, is concerned about the way the city has pursued cruelty accusations.

He recalled a recent case involving two pit bulls that had been badly, and intentionally, burned.

"We asked at one [animal shelter commission] meeting about the status of the kids who set these animals on fire. Our sense was the staff didn't know," he said.

When it comes to cruelty cases, "we've just had trouble getting follow-up," he said.

So far this fiscal year, Dallas has received 3,403 complaints about cruelty and forwarded 12 to the Dallas County district attorney's office for prosecution.

By comparison, Fort Worth has forwarded 49 cases to the Tarrant County district attorney during the same period.

Turner acknowledged that the city of Dallas needs to review its training and methods for investigating cruelty.

"If cruelty is an area we need to improve, then we need to improve," he said.

That could prove difficult as the city faces budget cuts that are squeezing every department. There are no plans to cut animal services officers, largely because stray dogs are always cited among the top concerns of residents.

But there is no money to expand service either at a time when the city's new shelter stays at capacity and animal services requests stream constantly into the city's 311 system.

"We just don't have enough people to be there around the clock," Turner said, referring to investigators and veterinarians.

"And even if we could hire another 40 people, we couldn't put any more animals" in the shelter, he said.

Turner said that's no reason not to push cruelty cases forward, and he expects to review how cruelty complaints are handled from the time they are received by City Hall.

Trimble said he wants to see that done and more, calling for the city's auditor to investigate.

"We are going to push really hard on this. If people realize they can get by with whatever they can get by with, then as far as animal cruelty is concerned, it will just be a lawless society," he said.