Column

Laws alone cannot protect animals from attacks

By JEFF WEBB
Published May 1, 2005

The memories still haunt Sharon Wilson and her father, 78-year-old William Lovelock.

On the afternoon of March 30, the quiet of their shaded, 21/4-acre lot on Neff Lake Road was pierced by the sound of barking dogs. That is not unusual, says Wilson. Her neighbor's dogs - three pit bulls and a German shepherd - woof it up on a regular basis.

But on this day, another sound, high-pitched and panicked, reached across the wire fence that separates Wilson's property from her neighbor's barnyard.

She and her Dad rushed outside the house, as swiftly as an acute arthritis sufferer and stroke victim can, to find the source of the commotion.

What they heard is what Lovelock laments.

"The worst thing was hearing its cries," he said softly, looking down and shaking his head from side to side. "It was just terrible."

What they saw is what they still have bad dreams about:

A pack of dogs ripping the flesh from the underside of a llama that was fighting for its life.

"The llama would struggle to its feet and the dogs would drag him back down. He had meat hanging from his haunches," said Wilson, who raised farm animals most of the 34 years she's lived in Hernando County. "It was heart-wrenching."

It went on for 10 minutes, but it seemed much longer, Wilson said. Her neighbor's brother and preadolescent son were trying to pull the dogs off the llama. Wilson said she threw a tree limb across the fence and they used it as a club to beat back the dogs.

But the damage was done.

The llama lay in the barnyard for a while before hobbling to a small pole barn. For the next 24 hours, it paced "like a cripple," Wilson said. The exotic pet's owner, Cheralyn Kerr, apparently was out of town; she later told officials she was unaware how seriously the llama was injured.

But Wilson was fully aware the animal was suffering. She was sickened it had not received medical attention. She reported the incident to the Hernando County Animal Services Department. The next morning two officers responded and examined the mauled llama. Their written report describes what they saw:

"We found (the llama) laying down in the stalls. We observed several wounds on the llama's face and right ear. The llama would not stand up so we rolled (him) on his right side and observed many open wounds ... on the llama's chest, right front leg, back legs, his right eye and many more wounds over his body. In order to observe some of the wounds, we had to move the fur. We picked up the llama to get him to stand up. (He) appeared weak and in shock."

The animal control officers reached Kerr, the animal's owner, on the telephone and she said she could not get a veterinarian to look at the llama right away. Realizing urgent care was needed, the officers called their own vet, Dr. Gretchen Neilsen, who examined the llama and called the owner's vet, who arrived sometime after 4 p.m. March 31.

The overdue medical treatment was in vain. The llama died from its injuries.

This was not the first, or the last, time the dogs would maim and kill. In February, the dogs attacked a pig on the property. It survived.

Sometime before they attacked the llama, they chewed off a goat's ear. On April 20, they finished the job.

"The goat went pretty fast. He was lucky," says Lovelock, comparing that relatively merciful slaughter to the slow death the llama endured.

Wilson, Lovelock's 45-year-old daughter, wonders which animal the dogs might choose as their next victim. There are two horses and some ducks on Kerr's property. There also is a "pot-bellied pig so old that it can hardly walk," according to Animal Services Department manager Liana Teague.

Teague's officers say in their reports that they have "counseled" Kerr repeatedly about the need to take better care of her animals. They've told her to secure the pen where her dogs usually stay. They've told her that if the dogs seriously injure one of her other animals, it is unlawful to let it suffer by not seeking medical treatment. They've told her that if the dogs get out of their pin and jump the fence, or attack someone else's livestock or family member, she will be cited and fined.

But for now, Teague says, the assistant county attorney has advised her that warnings are the only option.

And that is what Wilson can't fathom.

Apparently it is OKAY if your dogs attack and kill other animals, as long as it happens on your property. The dogs can't be prosecuted under Florida's "dangerous dog" statute, even if they kill repeatedly under those circumstances.

And the laws that forbid cruelty only apply to those critters that a person knowingly inflicts, or allows to be inflicted, on an animal.

It doesn't matter if, as a neighbor, you witness this blood-letting and deem it offensive and cruel. In fact, you'll need a videotape or photographs of the carnage to back up your complaint. A sworn affidavit is not sufficient grounds for prosecution unless the Animal Control officers see it, too, or they find other compelling evidence to support that charge.

Ironically, if your neighbor's dog creates a nuisance by barking too much, instead of killing too much, you won't need an audio- or videotape to make your case. A sworn statement is enough for officers to act on a complaint of barking.

I tried unsuccessfully to reach Kerr, and she did not return messages I left at her home and on her cell phone. I thought about knocking on the door of her house, but there was a gate across the driveway. Even if I had been inclined to trespass, I would not have; I could see only three of the four dogs.

I wanted to ask if Kerr was sad that the dogs killed her llama and goat. I wanted to ask if she is afraid the dogs will turn on her or her son, or someone else who visits their home. I wanted to ask if she is concerned for the safety of the horses that still roam the barren barnyard that now doubles as a graveyard for the goat and llama.

And, on behalf of her neighbor, Sharon Wilson, I wanted to ask that if the tables were turned, and Kerr was the one who had watched the attacks, what would she have done?

Some folks will read this story and say Wilson should mind her own business and that she overreacted to what she and her dad saw.

Others will be outraged and argue that this is clearly animal cruelty and that the law should classify it as such. Wilson is in that category. She says there should be an ordinance "to protect animals whose bad luck it is to be housed in the same yard as their vicious predators."

I disagree with both sentiments.

As an animal lover, Wilson had a responsibility to alert authorities that the llama was suffering. When the dogs mauled a goat three weeks later, she had every right to express concern about their pattern of vicious behavior.

As for the law, the ones that protect animals are just like the laws that protect people. You can't cover every possibility and, like morality, you can't legislate responsible behavior.

And that's what this is about. Captive animals depend on people to care for them. They rely on us to be compassionate and sensible and attentive. They expect us to be, well, humane.

Maybe stories like this help us learn how.

Reach Jeff Webb at webb@sptimes.com or 352 754-6123.

[Last modified April 30, 2005, 23:59:18]