Two pit bulls that attacked and killed a Boston bull terrier and injured its owner in Winslow last year are still condemned to die, after the Maine Supreme Judicial Court on Tuesday rejected an appeal on their behalf.
The original kill order, dated Nov. 29, 2016, said the dogs should be euthanized within 30 days. That order, which was stayed pending the appeal, is expected to be back in place once the clerk’s office at the Capital Judicial Center in Augusta receives official notice of the court’s decision.
Tuesday’s decision comes after the justices heard oral arguments on behalf of Danielle Jones, who owns the pit bulls, Kole and Bentley, on Oct. 13.
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The justices did not issue a written opinion outlining their reasoning. Instead, the court issued a two-page memorandum of decision that upheld the lower court’s ruling.
The decision said that all but one of the issues raised in the appeal were not brought up at the trial so the court could not consider them. The only remaining issue brought up at the trial, whether there was sufficient evidence to find the dogs were dangerous, was not argued on appeal, the justices said.
“This case is about community safety,” Kennebec County District Attorney Maeghan Maloney, whose office handled case, said Tuesday in an email. “It’s about feeling safe to walk the sidewalks of our neighborhoods.”
Efforts to reach Jones’ attorney were unsuccessful early Tuesday afternoon.
On Aug. 31, 2016, the pit bulls escaped Jones’ fenced yard and attacked a woman walking her 10-month-old puppy, Fergie Rose, the briefs filed in the appeal said.
The owner was bitten on both hands and had scratches on her back from trying to get her much smaller dog away from the pit bulls, the briefs said. The Boston bull terrier died a short time later at a local vet’s office.
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The attack and its aftermath was captured on surveillance cameras at Jones’ house and witnessed by neighbors.
The dogs have been held since that day at the Humane Society of Waterville Area, the same animal shelter where Dakota, the husky pardoned by Gov. Paul LePage, was held.
Jones was charged with two counts of keeping a dangerous dog, a civil violation that carries a fine of $250 per count. District Court Judge Eric Walker ruled in November 2016 that because the dogs had attacked and injured another dog in May 2015, they were dangerous and Maine law required that they be euthanized at the owner’s expense. That order was stayed when Jones appealed the decision.
Jones’ attorney, Richard Rosenthal of Oceanside, New York, later argued that Maine forfeiture laws should treat family pets differently than real estate or personal property. Also at issue is whether the decision to euthanize pets deemed dangerous should rest with a jury rather than a judge.
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