On March 15 before I left on vacation, I sent Coco, our cherished 6 year-old, 17 pound cockapoo to “The D.O.G.” in Putnam Valley for boarding and for help in acclimating her to other dogs, as she was fearful and intimidated by other dogs. The D.O.G. claims to specialize in anxiety, fear and other behavior issues and came recommended by another dog lover.
Eleven days into her stay there I received a horrifying call in which the trainer’s husband explained that my dog had been attacked.
To socialize my dog, the owners of the D.O.G. made the decision to put my dog with a pit bull mix and the pit bull sunk his jaw through Coco’s skull. She died several hours later, covered in blood and suffering from cranial bleeding and heart failure after enduring horrific pain.
The D.O.G., a facility that prides itself on its specialty in behavior training, not only refuses to accept responsibility for Coco’s senseless death, but refuses to disclose any information about the dog who killed her. There is no telling whether this dog has killed before and if a community is now at risk. And no safety or regulatory agency is interested in justice for Coco or in protecting future victims, canine or human – not the police, not County departments, not lawyers.
I have spoken to veterinarians and other behavior experts who maintain that a small, fearful dog should never have been put together with a pit bull mix, much less any dog who could overwhelm a small, fearful cockapoo and have the capacity to kill her. Common sense would indicate this as well. That this happened in the care of people who claim to be experts in dog behavior, including “anxiety, fear, aggression and temperament” is unconscionable.
The owners of the boarding facility state on their website that they only take dogs they have personally trained. They had not personally trained my dog before. These representations upon which people are relying are misleading – and for my family, heartbreaking.
I have been unable to find any reporting, investigatory, or regulatory mechanism where an incident involves dogs. The various people I spoke to at the County level, including the police, and the County legislator’s office suggest I contact a lawyer. Lawyers aren’t even interested because the law views animals as property and provides only for recovery of the cost of the dog in a civil suit, which would be far less than the cost of the lawsuit. More importantly, a civil suit would not address the larger issues that should concern us all. So many people rely on a bevy of dog helpers including boarding places, but who watches the watchers?
Wouldn’t you want to know about this incident if you were entrusting the safety of your dog to a boarding facility? If you had children and lived in the same neighborhood as the dog who killed? Though it is true that a person was not involved, one very well could be at any time. A dog is among us with blood on its jaws. No other family should have to suffer a loss as or more devastating than mine.
(Scarsdale 10583- April 4, 2012)
