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Shooter slays farm's sheepdog

By MICHAEL KRUSE
Published January 3, 2007

TRILBY - Last Thursday evening, just after dark, somebody shot the Mobley family's white sheepdog in their goat field on Power Line Road near Interstate 75 on the border between Pasco and Hernando counties.

The owners of the dog named Angel are offering a reward and the sheriff's offices from both counties are asking for help to find the killer. Anybody with any information is asked to call the Pasco tip line toll-free at 1-800-706-2488. The investigation is open and pending, said sheriff's spokesman Doug Tobin, but so far there are no suspects and no leads.

Just hard questions.

"Who would do this?" said Gene Mobley, a firefighter for Spring Hill Fire Rescue and a father of four young children. "I don't know. But a pretty sick person. To pull up on somebody else's property and violently shoot a beautiful animal that's doing nothing but protecting the goats?

"A pretty sick person."

"What possible satisfaction could anybody get from doing something like that?" said Joanne Schoch, the executive director of the Humane Society of the Nature Coast in Brooksville. "I don't understand. I really don't."

"Angel protected a small herd of little goats from predators such as coyotes and bobcats without realizing what she should have feared most was the soulless person who betrayed her and took her life for no good reason," neighbor Sue Alfano wrote in an e-mail to the Times Tuesday. "I suppose that's what we all should fear most."

On Thursday around 6:30, according to interviews and the Pasco sheriff's report, Joe Diez, a neighbor, was sitting by a campfire in his yard down a bit from Field of Dreams Lane when he heard one gunshot.

Then a yelp.

Diez saw tail lights speed away.

He went into his house and called Mobley's wife.

"Somebody just shot your dog!" he said.

The Mobleys' dog was a Maremma. They are rare and expensive and have been bred in Italy for thousands of years to protect sheep, goats, llamas and alpacas. They are gentle and affectionate and not considered suitable for attack training.

Angel was 2 years old. She protected the family's small herd of 25 or so goats in the 10-acre field behind the wood and wire fences on Power Line's Pasco side. Neighbors and folks from around the area drove by just to watch her do her work.

After the shooting, she limped over to Mobley and lay down at his feet.

"She looked up at me," he said.

"Not growling, or mad, or nothing like that," Diez said.

"We was petting her."

The bullet went into her right shoulder and through her stomach and out her back right leg.

Mobley and his wife took Angel to a vet in Wesley Chapel. The vet in Wesley Chapel had to put her to sleep.

Mobley said Tuesday afternoon that he has two theories. Neither of them is good.

Somebody was just out to kill something, anything, for no real reason. Or somebody wanted to steal one of his goats. But no goats were taken.

The area at the eastern ends of Pasco and Hernando is a place where the land opens up and the sky gets big. Firewood is sold out of front yards and squat oaks and hay bales sit like specks on the rolling hills. It was gray and drizzly and quiet on Tuesday afternoon.

There were little pink flowers set on the ground by the gate of the Mobleys' field.

A sympathy card was stuck to the front of the fence.

"We miss you Angel," it said.

And also: "We hope you catch who did this horrible thing. It's frightening to know evil is so close."

The neighbors are worried about their horses.

Alfano says she's going to make sure her doors are locked.

Diez listens for cars.

"You wonder if you're going to get shot at," he said. "You've got to stay on your guard. That's just the way it is nowadays."

Mobley has moved his goats to a different location. He didn't want to say where.

Michael Kruse can be reached at mkruse@sptimes.com or 352 848-1434.

[Last modified January 3, 2007, 07:01:59]