In February, Pat Patrick and Emily Dennis were arrested on charges of dog fighting. Ostensibly damning evidence was also seized—treadmills, antibiotics, etc. Their animals were rescued from their enclosures by the humane society and taken to be put in other small enclosures.
Numerous media stories talked about the glorious rescue of these dogs by the heroic humane society.
Over the next few months, virtually all of the dogs were killed by the humane society.
Nine months later, both defendants were acquitted because there was no compelling evidence that they had fought their dogs.
The day after Patrick and Dennis were acquitted, HSUS presented their 2008 Humane Law Enforcement Awards to the persons responsible for this raid.
I have no idea if these people were fighting their dogs or not. No idea if their dogs had good lives or not, and I am certainly not defending anything they may have done to harm the dogs.
What I do know is that the dogs were taken and killed before their owners even got to present their case in court. And no restitution was paid, no apology offered. Quite the contrary, awards were given out for those involved. And that simply terrifies me. That means the HSUS can raid anyone they want and seize their dogs. Their evidence could be something as specious as the fact that you spent thousands of dollars to purchase a treadmill to help exercise your beloved dogs. Sure, you may be proven innocent in the end, but your dogs will have been traumatized, over-vaccinated, hacked into, or just plain killed…
