Starved dog dies in animal abuse case

By Martin van den Hemel - Richmond Review - November 30, 2007

When Kilo and Shasta listlessly wandered into Michelle Smith’s backyard, drawn by a bag of garbage sitting on the deck, the two dogs were little more than a bag of bones.

It was around lunchtime on Tuesday and Smith’s own dog was inside the house and barking, drawing her attention to the back of her home.

“They were very skinny...emaciated...very weak.”

Though one of the dogs was a pit bull, the other a pit bull cross, that didn’t scare Smith, or deter her from taking action.

“It was so weak, I felt more sorry than anything else.”

After calling the Richmond Animal Protection Society, which asked that she pick up the dogs and bring them to the society’s shelter, Smith drove up and down Blundell Road, between Shell and No. 5 Road, looking for the dogs which by then had left the yard. She managed to round up one, and then the other, and bring them in.

“It’s sickening, it’s pathetic.”

It was the first time she’d seen the dogs, which didn’t growl and were very gentle, behaving as though they simply wanted somebody to take care of them.

“It was very, very sad and I don’t know if anything can be done against (the owner) but something should happen...They had no water obviously either.”

Carol Reichert, manager of the society’s animal shelter, said Shasta was conscious and able to stand up, and had been eating a bit of food when she began to have seizures. She was taken to a veterinarian hospital, but couldn’t be saved.

Kilo weighed very little, his ribs exposed, and could stand only feebly, when Reichert first saw the pit bull, which she believes will survive.

The dogs are believed to have belonged to the residents of a house on Blundell Road, east of Shell Road.

This is an example that animal abuse can happen anywhere, including Richmond, she said.

“We haven’t seen this since we’ve been at the shelter,” Reichert said. The society has been in operation for 17 years, built its shelter for cats in 1999, and this year took over responsibility for caring for homeless animals in Richmond.

The society has contacted the SPCA, and Reichert is confident they’ll be investigating this as a case of animal cruelty.

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http://www.bclocalnews.com/richmond_southdelta/richmondreview/news/11979891.html