Let me tell you I had a very traumatic day yesterday!
And some how I don't think I have even begun to see the end of what I will have to call nothing less than an abusive use of power not only by the Gwinnett County Police Dept. but by Gwinnett County Animal Control.
This is all happening on Saturday, August 13, 2011 and this is how I recall that it all went down:
I am sitting at my computer working on videos with my headphones on and with two dogs resting at my feet. I take a break and remove the headphones and the next thing I know I am hearing the sounds of Police officers in my house upstairs in my living room and kitchen! My husband comes down to tell me there a Police officers with weapons drawn and someone from animal control inside our house! My husband had also been working upstairs in his office on his computer when this all occurred. Neither one of us let the Police in.
I go upstairs and the first thing out of my mouth as I am totally feeling in shock and that my right to privacy has been totally violated is to ask what are you doing in my home? I say Please leave my home immediately! I am told by one of the officers we are here to take the dogs. Hand over the two dogs so we can leave!
At this point I am getting very upset and I demand to know what the dogs could possibly have done to warrant their busting into my home with weapons drawn. Specially since the dogs were in the house all night long and I had only earlier just let them out to go pee and then I brought them back in.
I am told we got a report of vicious dogs running loose and we are here to take them away. I again ask them, no I demand that they leave my home now, they clearly can see there is no one being attacked by a dog here and I point to the door. Next thing I know, I am being threatened with arrest for so called assaulting an officer just because I am standing my ground on my rights to privacy by ordering them to get out of my home, and I was pointing my finger toward the door, which they steadfastly are refusing to do. They demand to see my ID. They demand that I must come outside and I must relinquish the dogs.
So we head for the door, and I am livid, I state that I am not going to be intimidated by any of their unlawful and baseless threats and attempts at harassment toward me. I state that I know my rights, and I want them out of my home. I state again they are inside of my home and uninvited by me and that I did not call them and that no crime has been committed!
Anyway I guess the animal control person, a woman, (Head is her name I learn later) somehow gets herself situated behind the front door which is at the small landing of the stair case when the door is being opened. The one officer who had been the one speaking begins to step out the door and he pushes the door wide open trapping her behind it and slamming her into the wall. I grab the door to pull it back and he then forces the door open even more thus slamming her against the wall again. (Later I will be the one being accused of doing the slamming of her with the door.) He yells at me that he will arrest me for resisting an officer if I touch the door again. I explained to him what he is doing with the door to her and I am just trying to stop him from hurting her.
The officer demands my ID and demands my husbands ID and demands the dogs be given to them. I demand that they get out and I will be happy to come outside to speak with them but I will not continue to be threatened like this inside of my own house. My husband tells them he doesn't have to show them ID and they seem to accept that from him. Again the officer demands that he is going to take the black and brown dogs.
The brown dog actually belongs to our next door neighbor, but he thinks he belongs to us also. He has this bad habit of jumping their fence trying to get away from the puppies they have that irritate him. We have loved on him, fed him and made him feel welcome in our home. He actually is a brown pit bull but he is one of the most gentle and passive dogs one could ever want. Almost too passive, he actually just seems to want to curl up in a ball and hide and sleep most of the time as if to be saying if I stay real still maybe no one will even notice that I am here and I can get some peace. We call him the gentle giant because he has a rather massively large head. To some he may look scary, but that comes from their simple and pure ignorance of him and his actual personality.
The black dog is a Labrador puppy, a female less than a year old and she is just as friendly, playful, and non threatening as she can be. She just showed up one day a few weeks ago in our yard and she was hungry so we fed her and took her in. By this time she comes running up the stairs to the top of the middle landing where we are all now standing. The animal control person is still trapped behind the door due to the Police officer who is standing in the doorway. Standing up the stairs is my husband, and at the top of the stairs still in my living room is I believe two other officers who have not spoken and who I have not spoken to.
So back to the story. We are still at a stand off. The officer is demanding the dog, demanding my ID, demanding that I come outside where I know and feel and believe that he will claim he has the right to arrest me. I am being given no other option but to let them take away Sweety Pie the black lab who my 4 year old grand daughter has come to love and wants us to keep. My grand daughter and her mother who In fact are at the store at this very moment that this is all occurring buying Sweety Pie a collar, a leash and chew toys. They had just the day before bought her a 50 lb. bag of dog food. My Grand daughter and daughter are going to be just devasted when they get home if I let these jack booted thugs take away her new puppy.
So I release Sweety Pie and I allow her to go out the door because it is obvious that they will not exit my home until I do. (Later I will be accused of picking up the dog and throwing her out the door.) I am still demanding to know what the dog has done, demanding that they get out and demanding that they explain themselves to me as to what right they had to bust into my home presumably at the request of this animal control person.
By this time I look outside and there is 4-5 cop cars in front of our house and 2 animal control vehicles. I am thinking to myself, my God, what on earth is going on here! What are they trying to accuse this poor little playful and loving puppy of having done! And what on earth are they trying to now or going to be accusing me of doing? And a crowd of my neighbors is beginning to gather! All of this is for what?
You have got to understand, that just last week animal control ( a different person, an older and very nice man) had come out at the request of our next door neighbor to take one of his dogs off who he recently got back from someone who had abused it, and it was a Pit Bull. He had seen Red Dog, that is the brown dog, lumbering in the yard. While here the animal control officer also saw the black lab, Sweety Pie, and he told us he would let us keep her and that there is no other better or sweet kind of dog to have around children then a black lab. He had said she looked pretty much like a pure bred, with very fine and delicate feet and legs. I had said I though she looked like she must have some greyhound in her because she seemed so fine legged and sleek.
Keep in mind also that I grew up with a black lab. We got her when she was just a little puppy and I was 5 years old and we paid a nickel for her. My mom told us she would probably only be a temporary dog, and so her name became Temper. We had her for 11 years and she went every where with us and never left our sides. This black lab looked just like her and she reminded me so much of her that it was a natural that we would fall in love with her.
While my children were growing up we had a tri color pure bred beagle, named Molly Elaine McKinney. We had the pleasure of her in our life for 17 years. Her passing away is still so very sad that it makes me cry even now. She was our child together, my second husband and I. She was buried in a coffin we custom made for her in our backyard as we have lived here in this house for 28 years. Her professionally done photo still hangs on our wall. So we never thought that we could ever get attached to another dog, but then comes around Sweety Pie who seemed to change all that. We actually could see ourselves having her as our new pet and being able to love her maybe just as much. Then this all has to happen.
So continuing the story outside of the house, after I let the dog go out the door and I produced my ID for these band of terrorizors who had intruded into my life in such a traumatic way. Very quickly we tell them the story and that we want to keep her, and PLEASE don't take her, she couldn't possibly have done anything to warrant them taking her away. They say to me she is not your dog, and it is none of your business. She is our dog now, she belongs to Gwinnett County now. If you want her then you have to come adopt her like anyone else after she is fixed, micro chipped and given her shots and been put up for adoption if her owner doesn't come claim her first. I ask what is that going to cost me? $90 they say and what ever her boarding fee is by then. They say to me if she was your dog then we would have to give you a citation and you would have to come to court and fight to get her back.
Then they make their threats about my Ducks, they say to me and about those 2 Ducks you have in the backyard, you are not allowed to have Ducks! I said what? You are kidding me! What law says you can not possess 2 white Pekin Ducks in Gwinnett County for crying out loud! They say, oh its not up to Animal Control, that falls under some other agency, but we are going to report it that you have those Ducks. This is no doubt a threat that they are intending to carry out all because I dared to resist them and stood up for my rights. They certainly have gotten no complaints from anyone about my Ducks!
In fact earlier this month, police officers were called by one of the neighbors who got into a fight with another neighbor about their female dog who was in heat and coming around causing trouble. At that time we talked to those 3 police officers and we told them that female dog in heat had been attacking our ducks while they roam freely in our yard. They said nothing about having the Ducks being illegal, or you are not allowed to own the ducks. Instead they said that we had every right to protect our animals. They said the neighbors and we needed to call animal control as they, the Police couldn't get involved! Oh Really??
I am thinking to myself, My God, what on earth had I done to bring such evil, hateful, vengeful and despicable liars and what seems like power hungry and abusive people into my life trying to shake up my whole world now and upset my grand daughter on what had been this once peaceful Saturday in August?
This story continues with us going up to the animal control shelter on this very same day trying to see our Sweety Pie and make arrangements to get her back. My biggest fear is that something will have happened to her in the between time, that they will then try to claim we had done something hurtful to her, we had abused her, we had caused her some suffering that they will use to not allow us to adopt her back of all things.
We head up to Winder, a pretty good distance from our home, after first calling to make sure we can put our name on her to hold her for us and that they at the Shelter understand and won't put her up for general adoption as we were told would be done.
We had insisted to speak to a Police Supervisor over what happened. The Police officers supervisor Cpl K. L. Dukes, badge # 1005 came out to speak with us about what had happened. He reassured us that we would get our Sweety Pie back but only now she would have been fixed, micro chipped and given all her shots and it would cost us less money then it would have cost us to take her to a private vet. I told him I still wanted to file a complaint about what had happened and he said he would handle it with his officers and he gave me his card. He did not tell me how I could file a complaint and with whom.
The Animal control people gave us nothing in writing, no information on what to do next, no piece of paper or citation or anything to show that they had even come out or why. They just took her away from us and said it was none of our business. Basically saying that we have no rights, even though we told them we took her in and have been feeding her, caring for her, and housing her inside our home now for at least 2 weeks. Which according to my read of the ordinance says you are the defacto owner by being in possession at that point.
So at the shelter, the animal control person had not yet arrived when we got there at about 2:00. Sweety Pie was having to spend all day couped up in the back of her truck until she returned to the shelter. We toured the shelter and looked at all the dogs they had there most of which were Pit bulls. Animal Control person finally arrived there around 3:30. I saw her taking a dog out of the truck but did not see Sweety Pie. I approached and she was talking to another person. I stood there quietly just listening to what she was saying. She was having a grand old time telling this other person all about the excitement of the day and what had happened with this awful person. She accused me of throwing the dog out the door. She accused me of slamming her against the wall with the front door. She just went on and on with all her lies. I just stood there until finally she turned around and she saw me. I said to her loud enough for the other person to hear it. Very interesting story, but too bad none of it is true!
So I went back inside to wait. And we waited and we waited, and Brianna began to cry I want to see my doggie! Why did you take my doggie! I tried to comfort her. I asked the person at the desk if the animal control person was just doing this on purpose and taking so much time on purpose so that time would run out before getting the dog out of the truck? She said no I don't think so, let me see what is going on. The next thing I know there is a uniformed Gwinnett County Police officer walking briskly towards me saying what seems to be the problem mame. I said what, did they call you here because of us waiting to see our dog arrive safely? He said yes, they said you are causing a disturbance and you need to leave the property.
Oh boy here we go again. I am doing nothing in the world wrong, I called to tell them we were coming and to ask if we could see Sweety Pie when she arrived and they said yes, so we came on to put in the paper work to put her on hold and to see that see was okay. And this is how we are treated for caring enough about the dog to sit and wait and spend all day there.
Before I forget, when we arrived we gave them all our information, showed ID and made certain they understood that we were wanting to reclaim a dog that was forceably taken from us upon threat of arrest for no probable cause. The moment I did that they responded, well, oh no, we will never let you adopt a pet from here, not with that kind of history. To which I said exactly what kind of history are you talking about? Do you really mean the history that your animal control officer just earlier today caused by calling the Police to bust into our home and only much later claiming they were doing it to protect us from a vicious dog attack which is something that they just made up to cover their own buts! There was no vicious dogs ever in truth involved in this story. There was no abused or mistreated dogs ever involved in this story in truth. So now you are going to make up that there is some problem that you now will use to keep me from getting back the very dog that you forced your way into my home to take. And you now won't let me even see the dog to make sure she is okay or even let others see her react in my presence to confirm for everyone observing that she is not and has not been a dog abused by us? Just where in the world do you people think we live, Nazi Germany! Who the hell are you? Who do you work for? What right do you have to do what you did to us today? Yes I am still very much upset from my encounter with these liars.
Okay so before we left I went to the woman at the desk and told her Please make sure that nothing happens to our Sweety Pie! I think she understood and she said she would see to it. Stand there by as we left was that same animal control guy who had claimed he couldn't do anything about the problems we were having for six months straight in 2007-2008 with Pit Bull Backyard breeders of fighting dogs and claiming that he could not get the Police involved then to help resolve our situation. Thanks a bunch for nothing. We even went to court for that case and were willing to testify and brought photos and videos of the people and vehicles involved to prove what we had been enduring. That situation never would have ever gotten attention until I finally out of desperation called in the Gwinnet County Sheriff's office, which only caused the guy to move his operation some place else. Don't forget that when that dog breeder/fighter guy tried to run me down with his car and I got that on video and when he called some thugs on the phone to threaten to gang bang me and I got that on video, the Gwinnett Police even then did nothing about investigating him. So thanks a lot for nothing, and animal control next time you need me to help you, you can just forget about it.
My notes on these events are now posted here.