A dog breeder named Dan Christensen is suing a "rescue" group, HSUS and specific HSUS people, and several Turner County, SD officials. His farm was raided one year ago and he was charged with 173 counts of "inhumane treatment" of animals. His suit is grounded in the fact that a judge ruled that the search warrants were illegally obtained. The charges against him were dropped, and many of his dogs died in the care of the "rescue" group. Charges in his lawsuit include "deprivation of constitutional rights, malicious prosecution, emotional distress, criminal trespass and intentional damage to private property."
Christensen says "They took my grandchildren's pets, my daughter's house dog and our source of income. These dogs are hybrid hunting dogs, bred to hunt. We do bird hunts here and you certainly are not going to abuse your dogs and expect them to perform for you."
Christensen said his reputation as a breeder has been destroyed, and of course this type of personal and legal assault carries with it plenty of stress and economic harship. This has been harmful to his health in particular. The theft of this man's property was unacceptable, as far as he and his lawyer are concerned, and he is fighting back.
HSUS people were involved in this raid (they were ready to go before the warrant was even in hand). Their volunteers or staff had no legal right to be on his property or in any way handling, moving, examining, or caring for his dogs. Mr. Christensen's own veterinarian did not get an opportunity to examine the dogs before they were taken, but allegedly "so called veterinarians" from HSUS were there illegally. Later, his vet was allowed ten minutes to inspect 172 dogs!
The dogs had been kept in several locations, including two fairgrounds and the Second Chance Rescue Center. One website describes one of the new locations as a "storage shed instead of the kennels they were used to." They were allegedly being kept in a building with no sunlight or fresh air, and being exposed to parvo, with some of them becoming ill and some dying. In other words, rather than keeping the dogs in the secure location they were found in, under supervised care, until the legal battle was completed, the dogs were moved twice by strangers and housed in allegedly unsuitable conditions during the South Dakota winter.
Rosey Quinn, head of the "rescue" group, is one of the people this man is suing. Quinn is a "humane officer" employed by the organization she founded. She isn't happy about the suit, but she seems to think she'll be vindicated by the evidence against him. She doesn't think she did anything wrong. But in February, the court found that she purposefully misled the court in order to conduct the raid, and the charges against the dog owner were dropped.
Quinn claims that every dog obtained in the raid had giardia, coccidia, roundworms and tapeworms (none lethal in otherwise healthy animals). While that may be true, did their condition require an illegally obtained warrant, illegal trespass, and theft in order to improve their health?
Quinn asked for $10,000 to cover the costs of the animals her group had in their custody--animals she stole from him! The judge denied her request at that time, as there were only a very few puppies still at the shelter, with the rest fostered out. She also wanted him charged with fraud, as he apparently was attempting to sell pups as AKC registerable, when the AKC had temporarily cancelled his privileges. The judge denied that request also.
After the raid, Christensen made improvements on his property and was hoping to get his dogs back. As I looked for answers in this history, it appears that he was hesitant to take dogs back because of the dogs' exposure to parvo virus, which can be very difficult to destroy in the environment. At some point he was allowed to, or decided to, sell his dogs directly out of the Center's care. The best figure I could find was that all 172 adults and around 70 puppies have been sold, and for just over $100 each. It's quite possible that many of them were worth much more.
Christensens's attorney asked the County to stop using Second Chance as an animal control agency because so many dogs (more than 30) had contracted parvo and several other dogs had died from severe injuries. The county disputed those claims.
While the truth about the dogs' care before and after the raid is hard for this blog poster to know, one thing is certain: this man should fight for his constitutional rights, and I hope he prevails against HSUS, Quinn and her group, and others who violated his rights. "Rescue" people are too often swift to judge, swift to steal, and swift to call for the help of outsiders like HSUS.
This is not to say that all "rescue" groups or county officials operate the same way. There are certainly many situations which require the help of local volunteers and law enforcement agencies. But there are appropriate avenues to do those things, and there are plenty of good people capable of handling those situations with compassion and understanding.
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7 comments:
Everyone conveniently forgets that a sick puppy was purchased from this man. The puppy died a horrible death and the broken-hearted puppy owner demanded something be done. Second Chance Rescue and HSUS acted to prevent more deaths.
I did not find any evidence of that on the web, which is where my post came from. Was the puppy sick when purchased? Was the seller notified of the illness and given a chance to respond? Did he respond appropriately? I have seen nothing to answer those questions, either.
Regardless, sometimes puppies get sick and die. That's a terrible fact, and hard for any new puppy owner to experience, of course. But is HSUS called in every time a puppy dies? One sick puppy isn't enough to "warrant" what happened in this case.
I did read that many dogs died while in the care of Second Chance. That needed to be recognized, because the question then remains, "were the dogs sick because they were moved and in the care of someone else, or were they sick prior to the move, and help was too late?"
Again, the point of my post is not with regards to the health of the dogs or the ethics of the breeder/seller. The point is, no one has the right to trespass, harass, or take property and disperse it (especially living property which requires a certain level of skill to care for) without proper respect to the constitutional rights of the owner.
With regards to my emotional investment, this didn't happen in my area, so I don't know the conditions involved and speculating won't help. It's frankly none of my business, and I have no reason to get angry because a puppy died or because some dogs were unhappy or sick or whatever-- it's a local issue and those charges were handled locally. It's not for me to get upset about his dogs over there. But when constitutional rights are violated, I find it worthy to post about on my blog.
In addition, HSUS had no legal right there whatsoever. I believe that local sources and breed rescue groups are more appropriate sources of help for such situations.
The parvo outbreak didn't occur until well past the incubation period of 2 weeks for it to have come from Dan's dogs.
I'm not local to the area either, but have had the opportunity twice now to hear Dan's side of the story. His first time speaking to the public was while still recovering from the mild stroke he suffered and I can tell you there was not a dry eye in the house as this man relived a nightmare that caused him to break down in tears more than once. He is not an actor and the pain in his face and heart were very real.
I also had the opportunity to see pictures of his dogs from both his website and the ones taken by the "rescuers". They appeared in ALL pictures to be clean, fed, and sociable. Pictures of his kennels showed facilities that were not fancy, but were clean.
It came out in court that Rosey Quinn had been seen trespassing on Dan's property several times before the raid as testified by neighbors. It also came out that she was instructed by the county attorney to lie as needed about the condition of the dogs to get the warrant. That was the reason it was deemed illegal.
Dan didn't commit fraud regarding advertising AKC pups. His priviledge to register was suspended by AKC after the fact of advertising the pups and because of the raid.
Rosey Quinn was the one who started the "rumor" about Dan selling a sick pup. She was not able to give proof of it and it was not allowed.
Rosey also is the one who has been stating "all the dogs and pups had worms, coccidia, fleas,and giardia". In fact court records showed the vet reports showed SOME dogs and pups had one or more of those things. It stated some pups had roundworms. Roundworms are very common in pups, which is why we worm them. I never saw any other type of worms noted.
These were hunting dogs who had indoor/outdoor runs, were used for hunting as well as breeding. Hunting dogs can and do pick up giardia if they drink from a pond or come in contact with wild animal feces on hunts. It's usually controlled in regular worming schedules. Worms and coccidia are also common in the ground. If you have possums, raccons, squirrels, and other wild animals cross your property and defecate, you will most likely have worms, coccidia, and giardia on your property whether you live in the city or country. These things are in our pets and on regular vetting practices are usually dormant. Fleas are also treatable and not uncommon to be found on hunting dogs (or any dog). While they should be tended to, they are not reason to steal someone's property and business.
We have no idea whether Dan's dogs were just coming due for whatever normal vetting schedule they were on. From all accounts of people who know Dan personally, his vet was on his property regularly to handle whatever needed done at the time and his vet didn't seem to find his dogs uncared for over the past 20+ years. BTW...the vet reports turned into court said they found some fleas on the animals. None said heavy flea infestation.
In following Dan's story in many online articles, I've found the only people speaking against Dan and the care of his animals in the comments have been Rosey Quinn and a couple of people who work for her. His community who know him stand behind him.
I hope Dan wins his case against entities who believe they are above the law and our constitution.
Thank you second Anonymous Poster, as you've brought another side to the story, and clearly a local one. That is much appreciated, and I hope the readers take note of it.
That is the kind of information which brings value to this story.
It should also be noted here, that besides the obvious wrongdoing of the HSUS and local "rescue", the others named in the suit are equally, if not more so, to blame for this blantant violation of an individuals civil rights. Karen, the full lawsuit can be viewed here: http://humanewatch.org/images/uploads/2010-09-02_Christensen_lawsuit.pdf .
I also have no knowledge of the supposed sick puppy, that allegedly started this whole fiasco, but it should be noted also that is a puppy is out of someone's care for a length of time, one cannot know the source of illness. Now, before annonymos#1 responds, and says they should have been vaccinated, I want you to go and find any documentation, or an affidavid from any vet, that states that parvo vaccine is more then %90 effective on ALL strains of parvo. But, I suspect I'm wasting my time, because as #2 stated, I never found through searches of a sick puppy being purchased causing this either.
Keep your eye on this one..
This story is eerily similar to what happened with a small scale maltese breeder in NY several years ago. In the end, the case was eventually thrown out and the last of her dogs returned to her almost 2 years later, along with a tarnished reputation.
You can read about it here: http://www.pet-abuse.com/cases/11045/NY/US/
That site failed to keep updating the story beyond the return of the dogs to the breeder. Following all of that, the tables turned and this happened: http://www.midhudsonnews.com/News/2010/August/17/Dunn_sen-17Aug10.html
Dunn's apparent power trip from heading the local humane society while investigating animal abuse cases as the deputy sheriff in the same county finally came to an end with her spending 4 months in the county jail for perjury.
Thank you for sharing those links, as the similarities are interesting. While we certainly hope and expect our law enforcement officers to take care when applying for warrants, and to testify honestly, and while we hope and expect the same careful treatment of citizens from animal control/humane society officers, there are always a few that don't meet those expectations.
I think it is important that justice is applied equally across the board, and at least in this case, perjury did result in a sentence and the woman got her dogs back.
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