Jeffrey Mayhle, 45, had gotten into a physical fight with his ex-girlfriend, according to police reports. During the fight, Mayhle took the muzzle off one of her dogs, a male pit bull named Bruiser, knowing it would attack her other dog.
It did. Deputies found the dog, a 98-pound Chesapeake Bay retriever mix named Shyloh, bloodied with a severely injured front leg. Shyloh had been muzzled throughout the incident, unable to fend Bruiser off.
From there, Mayhle's and Bruiser's fates diverged.
Mayhle was arrested that night and charged with second-degree assault and animal cruelty. He is scheduled for a district court trial Oct. 12.
He faces up to 10 years in jail for the assault charge. The animal cruelty accusation brings up to 90 days behind bars and a $1,000 fine.
Three days after the attack, the Wicomico County Health Department deemed Bruiser a dangerous dog and placed him in quarantine at the Humane Society of Wicomico County, where he awaited the canine version of the death penalty: euthanization.
But the owner, whom DelmarvaNow will not name because she reported as a victim of domestic violence, appealed the decision.
Bruiser had his trial Wednesday, Sept. 21. To witness the proceedings of the relatively obscure Animal Appeal Board is to see human drama meet animal instinct. And the stakes couldn't be higher: life or death.
The judge and jury
Room 301 of the Wicomico County Government Office Building in downtown Salisbury was sparsely peopled for the dog's hearing. Seven people filled the seats in the audience, across from members of the Animal Appeal Board, who sat along a panel on the other side of the room.
The board was created in December 2008 by the County Council after a yearlong study of rural and metropolitan animal-control techniques across the country, board member Jack Elliott said in an interview. Having served on the board since its inception, Elliott said what came about from that study was a "pretty darn good system."
"I'm an animal lover," Elliott said. "I'm a private citizen who doesn't have any affiliation with the county. But everyone who has been involved with this board has brought with them a care for animals, so it's worked well. When the county executive had us sit down a few years ago to figure out how this would work, we were given a blank sheet of paper."
From the study came the five-member panel, consisting of a private citizen, a member of the sheriff's office, a health department representative, a licensed veterinarian and a dog trainer. The board advises the County Council on changes to the county's animal control laws and makes recommendations for schedule of fines and penalties for violation of the code.
On Wednesday evening, the board was called for its third-duty: to determine if a dog should be classified as dangerous.
The trial
An Animal Appeal Board preceding is much more informal than a court of law. There is a swearing-in of the witnesses and a county attorney on hand to make sure everything stays in order. After hearing from the health department official who issues the classification, usually based off the observations of the animal's "arresting officer," the board hears from the owner.
Then the victim of the attack testifies. From there, the board goes into a closed deliberation and decides whether the animal needs to be euthanized or other sanctions could be put into place.
In Bruiser's case, health department official Allison Marine testified, saying that the animal control officer who evaluated Bruiser and proposed the "dangerous dog" classification had told her the Aug. 27 incident was the fourth time Bruiser had bitten Shyloh.
The county's protocol for dangerous pets may be a "pretty darn good system," in Elliott's view, but it isn't perfect. Marine's testimony pointed to one flaw: Although the health department is responsible for making a determination on how much danger an animal poses to the community, no staff member has any training in animal evaluation. So, the recommendation is usually given based off the observations of the animal control officer.
During her testimony, the owner said she had adopted Brusier from Cambridge Animal Control in October 2014 because the 76-pound pit bull was having a hard time finding a home. His smile looked fierce, she said. She already had Shyloh, but the two got along wonderfully.
Their relationship changed, however, after the owner inherited a small, female dog named Lucy from a friend who died in March.
"I take full responsibility for this because I apparently was doing a lot of things wrong," the owner said.
When a female dog enters a home with male dogs, according to the testimony of dog trainer Lenore Bennett, there is a honeymoon period of about three months. After that, the male dogs have a "reshuffling" in the hierarchy wherein they may attack one another to establish dominance, Bennett said.
At the end of July, the owner said she noticed Brusier and Shyloh would growl at one another.
"Then they started fighting," she said. "I was able to break them up a few times and take them outside to run them off. At night, I would alternate which one would sleep with me so they wouldn't fight in the middle of the night; apparently that was wrong because it looked like favoritism in the dogs' eyes."
But the owner had a solution lined up. Jennifer Campbell, her daughter's girlfriend, had offered to take Bruiser in at her home in Harrington, Delaware. Campbell, an animal technician, said she built a $4,000 fence to keep Bruiser separated from other animals.
"I've watched this dog use cats as pillows," Campbell said. "If I get him home and I think he's dangerous, I will euthanize him. Sometimes two dogs, like two people, just don't click. This seems to be what happened here. Plus, it was a high-tension situation, with the domestic (incident) going on, so it's not a surprise a dog would act like that."
The Verdict
After a brief time to deliberate, the board called the meeting back to order.
Elliot motioned to reverse the dangerous dog designation for Bruiser, finding that the dog had attacked another dog owned by the same owner on the owner's premise, an exemption from the county's dangerous dog statute. Bruiser was ordered released from the Humane Society of Wicomico County's kennels.
"It feels amazing to know he'll be coming home," the owner said. "I feel like I can sleep now that my boys are safe."
Shyloh, the owner said, has made a full recovery and is expected to be back home next week after a stay at Peninsula Orthopedics.
While Bruiser will live to see another day, Bennett said pit bulls don't always get a fair shake.
"Pit bulls are automatically written off as aggressive dogs and, a lot of times, when people see dogs injured by another dog, the emotions get up," she said. "They want to punish that dog for what it did, but dogs don't think like people. Breeds like pit bulls and Rottweilers get a reputation because they are bigger dogs — and when a bigger dog bites, it can cause a lot more consequences and damages."
The law on pit bulls in Maryland
In Maryland, Prince George's County has had a ban on ownership of pit bulls since 1997. A few other small municipalities in the state have them as well. The Maryland Court of Appeals ruled in 2012 that landlords were liable for the damages caused by a dog owned by a tenant if they know it to be aggressive. The ruling also stated that if the landlord knew the tenant owned a pit bull, then he or she was automatically liable if the dog were to bite someone.
The state legislature struck down the breed specific ruling in 2014 by passing legislation that made landlords liable for damages extending from a dog bite case regardless of breeds.
(Delmarva Daily Times - Sept 22, 2016)
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