DryCreek
03-23-2007, 12:32 PM
http://www.news-leader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070323/COLUMNISTS17/703230392/1087/NEWS01
Pit-bull mix must keep his nose clean after 20-month ordeal
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Dennis Taylor fidgeted outside the city Animal Shelter on Wednesday, awaiting the pet he hadn't seen in 20 months. "I been waitin' for this moment a l-o-o-ong time."
In his hand, he had a makeshift dog-handling tool, a piece of pipe with a long piece of cloth rope threaded through it. Once Oz was to be released after almost two years, Taylor wasn't sure what to expect.
"I think he'll know me and still be the same happy dog he was," Taylor said. "But I don't know after all this time."
He needn't have worried about the dog, which a municipal judge ordered released to Taylor on Monday. The city impounded Oz because he'd bitten a child. As Supervisor of Animal Control Officer Randy Barnts brought the dog from the "vicious dog" impound quarters, the dog yipped joyously, jumped at Taylor through the fence and tried to poke his nose through the gate toward the man.
"Hey, old man, what you doin'?" Taylor said, as thrilled as Oz, his pit-bull mix. Fred Taylor, Dennis' brother and the man who helped raise the dog from a pup, started talking in the baby-talk voice people use for beloved pets.
"You glad to see your Uncle Fred?"
As Barnts unlocked the padlock to the fenced area, Oz jumped on Dennis and licked his face, thumped his tail furiously and enjoyed happy pats from both men. Then he pulled them toward the grass, trees and poles, pee-claiming the outdoors he hadn't seen for so long.
Oz rolled in the dirt and gave himself a grass backrub. He smelled all the swell smells, dug a little and ran around ecstatically. "You a mess," Fred said affectionately as he rubbed grass off the dog's coat. "You gimme that tail," he said, and pulled at the dog's wagging tail.
Oz's jailing began in July 2005, after visitors arrived at Dennis Taylor's Springfield house where Oz was legally tethered and Dennis' yard was marked with "No trespassing" signs. An 8-year-old girl's mom stayed in the car to look for a cigarette — as she told me in a telephone interview. Her boyfriend went into the house, and three of Dennis' friends waited for Dennis to get back from the auto-parts store. Then the girl ran to the dog and grabbed his bone from under his nose.
Oz bit her in the face.
The city impounded the dog and charged Taylor with keeping a vicious dog.
The city also wanted Dennis to pay an impoundment fee for every day Oz was at the shelter. By Wednesday, the bill had climbed to over $4,800.
Dennis vowed to fight as long as he could to get his dog back. Along the way, Republic attorney Price C. Kellar III decided to become involved in the case of the client he had represented 15 years before, Dennis Taylor.
"What was the dog doing that wasn't being a dog?" Kellar asked. He argued that Oz had been provoked, an exception in the city's vicious dog ordinance.
The case eventually entailed several court hearings, appeals, a "not guilty" jury verdict in favor of Taylor in Greene County Circuit Court, a subsequent appeal by City Prosecutor Johnnie Burgess in Municipal Court and Monday, a ruling by Municipal Court Judge Dennis Budd that the city's appeal was denied. Budd issued a court order to return the dog to Taylor.
On Wednesday, Burgess filed yet another court proceeding: A petition for review of Budd's administrative decision.
But for now, Oz has gone home with the Taylors. Our hope is that they do the most responsible things with him. He isn't neutered yet, which adds to a dog's problems if he isn't mightily corralled.
They'll have to get Oz all his shots, because the city does not when an animal is impounded — even for 20 months. That's a worry. "You would have to be concerned — the handlers are giving them food and water every day," says veterinarian Dr. Tedd Hamaker, a member of the City Council-appointed vicious-dog committee, whose advice on the issue the council then ignored.
"If they're going to keep these dogs for a year, I'd think it would be a lot cheaper" (to avoid a handler bitten by a sick dog or an outbreak of a disease)," Hamaker says. Some of the diseases dogs get are contagious, and others can be spread by oral or fecal contact. "Let's face it. Shots are cheap."
Taylor will have to try his best to keep Oz's nose clean. Once a dog has bitten, he is always suspect, even though when I had a cocker spaniel, the breed was tops on the list of dogs most likely to bite.
So much for Dick, Jane and Spot, huh?
Dogs will be dogs. I wouldn't dare pull a bone from under even my own big dogs that stop when I scold, "No!" Dogs' instincts take over, and human instincts have to do our best to outsmart theirs to keep everyone — and every dog --safe.
Pit-bull mix must keep his nose clean after 20-month ordeal
http://www.news-leader.com/graphics/pixelclear.gif
Dennis Taylor fidgeted outside the city Animal Shelter on Wednesday, awaiting the pet he hadn't seen in 20 months. "I been waitin' for this moment a l-o-o-ong time."
In his hand, he had a makeshift dog-handling tool, a piece of pipe with a long piece of cloth rope threaded through it. Once Oz was to be released after almost two years, Taylor wasn't sure what to expect.
"I think he'll know me and still be the same happy dog he was," Taylor said. "But I don't know after all this time."
He needn't have worried about the dog, which a municipal judge ordered released to Taylor on Monday. The city impounded Oz because he'd bitten a child. As Supervisor of Animal Control Officer Randy Barnts brought the dog from the "vicious dog" impound quarters, the dog yipped joyously, jumped at Taylor through the fence and tried to poke his nose through the gate toward the man.
"Hey, old man, what you doin'?" Taylor said, as thrilled as Oz, his pit-bull mix. Fred Taylor, Dennis' brother and the man who helped raise the dog from a pup, started talking in the baby-talk voice people use for beloved pets.
"You glad to see your Uncle Fred?"
As Barnts unlocked the padlock to the fenced area, Oz jumped on Dennis and licked his face, thumped his tail furiously and enjoyed happy pats from both men. Then he pulled them toward the grass, trees and poles, pee-claiming the outdoors he hadn't seen for so long.
Oz rolled in the dirt and gave himself a grass backrub. He smelled all the swell smells, dug a little and ran around ecstatically. "You a mess," Fred said affectionately as he rubbed grass off the dog's coat. "You gimme that tail," he said, and pulled at the dog's wagging tail.
Oz's jailing began in July 2005, after visitors arrived at Dennis Taylor's Springfield house where Oz was legally tethered and Dennis' yard was marked with "No trespassing" signs. An 8-year-old girl's mom stayed in the car to look for a cigarette — as she told me in a telephone interview. Her boyfriend went into the house, and three of Dennis' friends waited for Dennis to get back from the auto-parts store. Then the girl ran to the dog and grabbed his bone from under his nose.
Oz bit her in the face.
The city impounded the dog and charged Taylor with keeping a vicious dog.
The city also wanted Dennis to pay an impoundment fee for every day Oz was at the shelter. By Wednesday, the bill had climbed to over $4,800.
Dennis vowed to fight as long as he could to get his dog back. Along the way, Republic attorney Price C. Kellar III decided to become involved in the case of the client he had represented 15 years before, Dennis Taylor.
"What was the dog doing that wasn't being a dog?" Kellar asked. He argued that Oz had been provoked, an exception in the city's vicious dog ordinance.
The case eventually entailed several court hearings, appeals, a "not guilty" jury verdict in favor of Taylor in Greene County Circuit Court, a subsequent appeal by City Prosecutor Johnnie Burgess in Municipal Court and Monday, a ruling by Municipal Court Judge Dennis Budd that the city's appeal was denied. Budd issued a court order to return the dog to Taylor.
On Wednesday, Burgess filed yet another court proceeding: A petition for review of Budd's administrative decision.
But for now, Oz has gone home with the Taylors. Our hope is that they do the most responsible things with him. He isn't neutered yet, which adds to a dog's problems if he isn't mightily corralled.
They'll have to get Oz all his shots, because the city does not when an animal is impounded — even for 20 months. That's a worry. "You would have to be concerned — the handlers are giving them food and water every day," says veterinarian Dr. Tedd Hamaker, a member of the City Council-appointed vicious-dog committee, whose advice on the issue the council then ignored.
"If they're going to keep these dogs for a year, I'd think it would be a lot cheaper" (to avoid a handler bitten by a sick dog or an outbreak of a disease)," Hamaker says. Some of the diseases dogs get are contagious, and others can be spread by oral or fecal contact. "Let's face it. Shots are cheap."
Taylor will have to try his best to keep Oz's nose clean. Once a dog has bitten, he is always suspect, even though when I had a cocker spaniel, the breed was tops on the list of dogs most likely to bite.
So much for Dick, Jane and Spot, huh?
Dogs will be dogs. I wouldn't dare pull a bone from under even my own big dogs that stop when I scold, "No!" Dogs' instincts take over, and human instincts have to do our best to outsmart theirs to keep everyone — and every dog --safe.