Dogs are ordered to be put to death, even if they may have bitten more out of fear than out of meaness, or they have been provoked. A man takes excellant care of his snakes, provides the proper kind of housing, food, temperatures, etc. for them, yet the District Attorney goes after him.
For those who haven't been to San Francisco, get used to it. Cops and District Attorneys would far rather persecute people who've done nothing wrong than ever bother any real criminals.
They never even let animal behaviorists and/or trainers work with these dogs before they execute for them. That's because of the hoopla over that woman who was killed 3 years ago. They now treat all dogs who've bitten anyone (even in self defense) as if they were those 2 killer dogs.
And it makes no difference how well you care for your snakes and lizards. You're a criminal. If you want San Francisco to go easy on you, sell crack or heroin.
I simply must reply that your accusations of "typical" San Francisco enforcement policies smack intensely of what many may argue are "typical" of the hypersensitive, ultra-earnest, "we-are-victims-of-the-system" position for which San Franciscans are quite famous.
That you will "boycott" the Animal Cops show until policies change is entirely laughable .
I personally know many of the SF Animal Control Officers. These people work long hard hours, rotate shifts so that everyone takes graveyard duty at some time, and put themselves in risky situations dealing with the public each day.
Are they well-paid? Heck no. Why would they do it? Because they care- a lot- about the animals.
You may have a point that ordinances about the keeping of reptiles my need a revision. Fair enough. But do be realistic and direct your insults to those who are in a position to hear you. Sorry, but Animal Planet Channel doesn't care about your opinion, and the officers on the street are charged with enforcing policy, not creating it.
If you want to see change, I challenge you to summon all your civic energies, march down to city hall and find out how to affect change in our community.
[This message was edited by mod_kelly on 02-02-05 at 04:29 PM.]
I was completly appalled at the show that I watched last night. I will probably never watch Animal Cops San Fran again. You call yourselves Heroes? You put down a dog that could of been saved with a little more than training (Oseeto). There was one dog that helped by a hero. That man was a family member of the dog. The entire show was about how miserable you could make everyone around you. As far as I'm concerened, if you come to my neighborhood, I will bite you!
In attempting to create laws that prevent serious maulings, they have created a law too broad in its application with entirely too much power in the hands of a few so-called "experts". Ocito could have been saved. What I saw was a dog with high prey drive (chasing).... he didn't bare his teeth, growl, and lunge. So I would say he wasn't overly aggressive, just wanted to catch and nip prey. That can be re-trained. I have done similar training with a large dog (doberman) that reacted to strange dogs with barking and growling and lunging. Totally gentle in every other way. I retrained him with hot dogs in a matter of weeks. I think a large factor motivating the destruction of this dog was fear of lawsuits arising if they didn't. I am sure however that the owner would have agreed to intensive re-training of herself and the dogs. And why wouldn't they let her keep the one other dog? To punish her? How awful! I saw the guilt and shame in the eyes of the hearing officer and the ACC officer. As well there should be. Maybe the ACLU needs to get involved. That woman's rights were violated. Not to mention the pain and suffering she and the dogs were caused. BTW, I don't agree that Animal Planet doesn't care about these opinions. Enough people writing and protesting this show would make an impression.
all the other animal cops show are about helping and saving dogs, not just putting them to sleep. This show needs to show some of that if it wants to be as psoular as the other animal cop shows. I donate money to Houston and New York for their work. At this point in the program, I would not donate to S.F.
New York, Detroit, and Houston Animal Cops Shows give a good impression to most people on the Boards. They seem to impart that they at least care for the animals, that the animals are their priority, even though they also must follow regulations.
Miami and San Francisco Shows do not seem to be imparting that same impression to most people here on the Boards.
Yet BOTH Miami and San Francisco (SF very quickly, please note) have their own Forums, while Houston does not.
Where is Houston's Forum? Why is there no Forum for Houston?
Also, why would there be Forums for Miami and (now quickly)San Francisco, which do not seem to be very popular here at all?
As Alice would say: "Curiouser and curiouser!"
[This message was edited by free_animals on 02-02-05 at 09:32 PM.]
I am really quite surprised by the reaction the death of the biting dog 'ocito' is getting. I have worked at a shelter in the mid-west. It was my daily duty to euthanise about 10 dogs because we needed the space. Sometimes this happened because the dog gave me a 'funny look' or was at the back of the cage rather than the front. Every small shelter in the country goes through this kind of brutality because someone has to take responsibility. If these dogs are lucky they get put to sleep by someone who cares and does the job well. None of these dogs got the luxury of being able to bite even one person, let alone 5. Instead of focusing on the tragedy of one dogs fate/one owners stupidity, why not start raising funds for spay/neuter campaigns or bigger shelters or make yourself available to foster litter after litter of puppies and dogs with health and behaviour problems. Some perspective would be nice.
To fanfromSF:I NEVER said anything about boycotting the show. How would I know what was happening on the show if I didn't watch it. As for your patronizingly insulting advice: I've been going to City Hall, protesting, writing, calling City officials for many years regarding both animal welfare and other issues. If you're in this weird little town, you know that not one person at City Hall is inclined to listen to something that's bears the faintest resemblance to common sense. I'm not a San Franciscan, I'm a Chicagoan who's stuck here for the time being. I can tell you no Chicago snake owner would have put up with the ridiculous treatmemt that guy on the show was taking. Victim of the system? Well what do you call it when the drug dealers take over your neighborhood and the officials hassle the law abiding folks who try to do something about it? As for Sgt. Herndon, he reminds me of a New York judge long ago who ordered the execution of a dog who mauled the man who tried to rape his owner. That's another thing that would never happen in Chicago, unless they've gotten really stupid since I left.
As for the hardwork and lousy pay of the ACC officers; what makes you think I'm unaware of it? I didn't attack the officers, I attack the brain-dead policies of the people who run this town. All they care about is that the City never gets sued in another dog mauling case. So their attitude is "if he bites, kill him". Nevermind the circumstances. How can you defend that?
Pigears - your post had some excellent suggestions. Definitely spay/neuter. My screen name is taken from the statistics: 11420million is 1 unspayed female cat + 1 unneutered male cat = potentially 420,000,000 cats in 7 years.
So many healthy, gentle animals are put down not because they did anything agressive but because there are just not enough homes.
I truly believe that no animal should be sold or adopted unless it is first neutered, unless being sold to a legitimate breeder who should be required to have a breeder's license; the license should be a moderate cost (to discourage the casual "puppy mill" types) and a portion should be given to spay/neuter programs.
San Francisco is one of the most animal-friendly cities in the US. The only reason that it appears that we kill lots of dogs for reasons related to aggression is this:
In the other cities where Animal Cops is filmed, animal cruelty cases are assigned to the SPCA or Humane Society while animal aggression issues are assigned to the police. So in New York, Detroit, Miami, and Houston, all you see are rescues and the only euthanasias are related to disease, aggression in abused dogs, or (in the case of Detroit) automatic euthanasia of seized pit bulls.
In San Francisco, Animal Care & Control handles all enforcement of animal-related laws and ordinances. This means that they rescue animals from cruelty but also have the responsibility for seizing and dealing with, for example, dogs that have bitten people.
Furthermore, the program doesn't always show the whole story. Everything is edited down for maximum dramatic impact.
My several dogs and I have live in San Francisco for a long time and have developed an absolute trust in ACC and the whole "animal court" process.
Cheers, JJW
[This message was edited by mod_kelly on 02-08-05 at 04:55 PM.]
The confiscation of nice, healthy snakes from a knowldegable breeder made me sick. As I watched the "heroes" take away the collection and try to explain what the collection consisted of, I had choice names for the "heroes" and the names weren't very complementary.
Ok, I admit, I've only seen 3 episodes of SF, but the one I've seen showed that they are patient and caring. An example was the two dog biting incident. They did not just terminate the dog, but brought in behaviorist in order to find out which one of them did the biting. One was put to sleep and the other was labeled.
Maybe I've missed more "negative episodes", but my oppinion is from 3 episodes thus far.
