Ohio Supreme Court partially dumps dog law
COLUMBUS––The Ohio Supreme Court on September 22 ruled 4-3 that the part of the Ohio law requiring restraint of “dangerous and vicious” dogs is unconstitutional because it does not allow the owners to contest the “dangerous and vicious” designation before they are criminally charged.

“We find it inherently unfair that a dog owner must defy the statutory regulations and become a criminal defendant, thereby risking going to jail and losing her property, in order to challenge a dog warden’s unilateral decision to classify her property,” wrote Justice Francis Sweeney for the majority.

Janice Cowan, 50, of Mogadore, argued that her German shepherd and two of the dog’s mixed-breed offspring were unjustly killed after the two mixed-breed dogs mauled neighbor Margaret Maurer, on Maurer’s property. The dogs were chained, but the chains apparently allowed them to range beyond Cowan’s property. Cowan was subsequently convicted of four misdemeanors for failing to properly confine the dogs. A three-judge panel from the Ohio 11th District Court of Appeals rejected two of Cowan’s three claims of unjust treatment, but agreed 2-1 that Portage County violated her right of due process.

“Cowan had a meaningful opportunity to contest the evidence that her dogs seriously injured Margaret Maurer on October 1, 2001,” wrote dissenting Justice Terrence O’Donnell, “and had the same due process rights accorded to any other defendant. In other instances of criminal prosecution,” O’Donnell continued, “the state removes defendants from society pending trial, seizes the evidence from a crime scene––often the home of a defendant––pursuant to a warrant pending trial, even removes children pending trial, and otherwise takes actions designed to preserve evidence and maintain safety and security in society pending outcomes of trials. Requiring these dogs to be secured pending trial is not a denial of due process, but rather a reasonable measure designed to maintain neighborhood safety.”

Added Chief Justice Tom Moyer in a separate dissent, “The majority leaves Ohio with statutory definitions of ‘dangerous dog’ and ‘vicious dog,’ but no requirements for confining such dogs and no requirement that an owner of a dangerous or vicious dog obtain insurance against liability for injury caused by such a dog. The majority does so despite the clear mandate of the General Assembly.”

Justice Maureen O’Connor concurred with Moyer.

“Ohio is the only state to define vicious dogs by breed (pit bulls) as well as behavior,” noted the American Dog Owners Association web site. “The Ohio Supreme Court decision does not affect owners of pit bulls, as pit bulls are automatically considered vicious under current law.”

The Ohio Supreme Court in 1991 upheld the part of the law defining pit bulls as inherently vicious.

AAS: any confined dog can escape confinement and be a danger. In fact, confining dogs is one of the ways to make a dog dangerous, so confining laws are counter to public safety.

One way to reduce the danger of dog bites is prohibit confinement, not to legally impose it. If lawmakers choose more stringent confinement laws, rather than humane laws, they will only have to address this problem again and again, as they have not understood the root causes and they have chosen a quick, cheap solution that will only make more dogs more dangerous.

Dog-lovers should be encouraging law makers to choose control of dog breeding and owning, and prohibiting the keeping of dogs as guards, or lawmakers will choose the quick-fix of outright bans.

An outright ban on the breeding or owning of the monster breeds that are going to start proliferating soon, Cane Corso, Fila Mastiff, Argentinian Dogo, etc, must be made law very quickly, before there is an established right to continue in the business of breeding and selling of these dogs.