In fact, one hour into 2016, at 1 a.m. on New Year’s Day, Donley and her teenage son, Keaton, returned from Christmas vacation to their Rapid City home to find their dog gone.
It turned out that 2-year-old Spanky had been taken by the animal shelter on Dec. 30 after Donley’s tenants called the police to report that the animal was being neglected. Spanky, a male mixed-breed Labrador retriever, has since been housed at the Humane Society of the Black Hills where he has racked up a bill estimated at $1,500.
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| Keaton Donley poses with Spanky |
Donley, 44, has been charged with animal neglect, a Class 2 misdemeanor that carries a maximum penalty of 30 days in jail and a $500 fine. She is determined to fight the charges; she was in court on Tuesday, pleaded not guilty, and has a trial date set.
“The whole thing has been a farce from the start,” said Donley, who said she thinks her previous tenants — a couple with a little girl — called the authorities to get back at her for evicting them on Dec. 23 after they refused to pay their full rent for that month.
“The renters got their eviction notice the day we left for Montana for Christmas," Donley said. "Seven days later, all of a sudden they’re saying that we abused the dog? Why couldn’t they have said that when they moved in, or somewhere in between? How could it be so obvious?”
What Donley finds especially calculating was how her tenants turned away one of the three people she asked to check on Spanky while she and her son were away.
Rick Sidle, Donley’s neighbor in north Rapid, went to her house one day after Christmas and found that the tenants had the dog in their basement residence. “They said, ‘We’ll take care of the dog, and when she gets back, we’ll give her the dog,’” Sidle recalled. “I figured he was already taken care of, and I didn’t know the situation between her and the renters at that point in time."
Her tenants, Donley said, were not allowed to take Spanky. But they had access to the room where the dog was kept, since it was the only way they could get to their rooms in the basement.
The tenants, who moved out in January after four months at Donley's home, disputed her version of how the events unfolded. Greg Bass said he and his girlfriend decided to withhold one-third of their monthly rent for December because the heating in their place was broken, and they wanted Donley to get it fixed first. (Donley said that is not true, as she uses the same furnace they do.)
Bass acknowledged in a phone interview talking to Sidle when the neighbor came over and telling him that he (Bass) was now taking care of the dog. “I told him, ‘It’s been two days, and it’s been negative degrees out here both days, and you’d just come in to take care of this dog? After two days of no food, no water, no nothing, you just came to take care of the dog?’
“I said, ‘No, we already took him to the house … and I will let her know that we’re going to take care of the dog.” But Bass said he didn’t intend to keep Sidle away.
Bass said he didn’t plan for Donley to get into trouble with the law. He only called the police because he was worried about Spanky’s health.
“He was literally dying,” Bass said. “He wasn’t moving, he wasn’t doing anything. He was just laying there. … I took him downstairs to take care of him until she got back, but she wouldn’t let us. I got all the messages of her saying, ‘No, put my dog back.’”
After the Humane Society had taken possession of Spanky, Donley said an employee at the shelter told her the dog was 2-1/2 pounds underweight at 54-1/2 pounds; he was 57 pounds when the shelter last had the dog in June.
Spanky's three previous scrapes with the Humane Society were when animal-control officers caught him running around the neighborhood. Donley said she thinks one or more local kids with malicious intent took the dog off its leash, opened her gate or made it jump over her fence, then reported the animal to the pound.
What?! That's just dumb.
The dog crossed the Donleys’ path two summers ago, when it ran up to Keaton and his friends while they were skateboarding in their neighborhood. LaRay doesn’t like dogs, but she relented to letting her son keep Spanky when she saw that the 6-month-old puppy had already been trained.
In less than two years, Keaton and his pet seem to have become the best of buddies. The 15-year-old sophomore at Central High School said he shares his room with Spanky, takes him on walks every day and even brings him skateboarding with him and his friends.
When his mom divorced her husband last year, the animal provided him with comfort and security. “The dog’s all I have other than my mom. I don’t really have anything else,” Keaton said. “I just want him back.”
Even with a legal matter unsettled, Assistant City Attorney Jessica Rogers said, owners usually may take their pets home once they’ve paid their bill with the Humane Society because the shelter doesn’t want owners racking up charges. But if the owner is a repeat offender, or the animal is in bad shape, then the owner must wait for the court to resolve the case.
In the seven weeks since Spanky was taken, Donley’s bill with the Humane Society has gone up to $1,500, her public defender Matthew Rappold told her Tuesday. Donley refuses to pay it and hopes a not guilty verdict will make it disappear.
But Rogers said the shelter’s bill has nothing to do with the court case, so the court’s verdict won’t have any effect on it. Humane Society Executive Director Jacque Harvey, however, said her organization does “work with people” who are hard up because the shelter’s objective is to get animals home and ensure they are getting proper care.
What, Donley is asking, has the Humane Society done for Spanky to run up a bill of $1,500? Harvey declined to comment on her case.
A client’s usual charges, according to the Humane Society, include the animal’s boarding fees ($20 per day after the first 24 hours, for non-rabies cases) and reclaim fee ($60 if the animal is spayed or neutered; otherwise $75). The reclaim fee increases each time an animal is taken back to the pound within a six-month period. Those without a microchip, which contains their owners’ information, are automatically chipped ($50) and vaccinated ($20).
Donley is upset with the Humane Society for taking Spanky without informing her family, even though he has a dog tag with contact numbers, as well as a microchip. The shelter also has not allowed Keaton to see the dog beyond one visit in early January, she said.
Since the Humane Society wouldn’t answer questions on Donley’s case, the Journal couldn’t determine if the shelter tried to call the Donleys before taking their dog. Harvey said the reason the Humane Society does not allow visits is that it doesn’t have the personnel to accompany visiting owners, and shelter employees worry about the “added stress to the animals when their owners leave them behind.”
Her trial is scheduled to begin on March 16. Her former tenant, Bass, said that he is willing to testify against her in court.
Rogers, the assistant city attorney, said that on a first offense for animal neglect, the defendant found guilty usually does not get the maximum penalty.
With all her recent troubles, Donley said she had forgotten that 2015 had at least one big highlight: She got her master’s degree in teaching. But lately she has just been consumed with making ends meet, paying her student loans and getting Spanky out of the pound.
(Rapid City Journal - Feb 22, 2016)
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