Editor’s Note: A series on the history and proceedings of the Lewis County Dangerous Animal Designation Board will be published in upcoming editions starting this Saturday, Nov. 12.
After an appeal on Friday, an Onalaksa dog named Bull will face no county-required repercussions after he bit and severely injured the face of a 5-year-old boy who pushed the dog when he noticed Bull eating brownies on a kitchen countertop.
In Lewis County, dogs designated as “dangerous” by a commission-appointed panel of citizens are allowed to continue their lives, with certain owner-met requirements, or be put down.
The quasi-justice system for Lewis County dogs comes with a trial. Some dogs are determined to be “not dangerous” by the panel.
On the day the Dangerous Animal Designation Board was scheduled to convene for the case of Bull, a male 9-year-old mixed black lab that bit the cheek of a 5-year-old boy, the chair of the board was in the hospital while his wife had an early baby. Instead, a representative from Lewis County Public Health & Social Services was called to preside over the trial against Brittany Wilkening, of Onalaska, the owner of Bull the dog.
To meet state standards of a “dangerous” animal, a dog must inflict severe injury on a human or domestic animal without provocation. Proof that the victim provoked the dog before an attack is defense in the dog owner’s favor.
The 5-year-old boy’s name is being withheld from The Chronicle due to his age. On July 8, the day of the incident, the boy was in Wilkening’s care while his father was at work, according to documents obtained by public records request. The child had been around the dog for about nine months, according to the documents, and Bull and the boy had previously gotten along well.
Several days after the attack the child reported he was bitten by Bull after seeing the dog standing with his front paws on a kitchen counter to access a plate of brownies, according to a statement from the boy’s custodial father.
Bull was eating the brownies when the boy saw him, so, per the statement, he shoved the dog down off the counter with an open palm when Bull attacked and severely injured the child’s face.
In the original hearing, Wilkening’s lawyer — which she is entitled to have in the dog trial, but many owners opt not to hire one — argued the boy pushing Bull off the counter was provocation. The dog was ruled not dangerous.
On Friday, Lewis County Humane Officer Alishia Hornburg and Civil Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Barbara Russell appeared in front of the Lewis County Hearings Examiner on the case again, opposite Wilkening and her lawyer. There was also an attorney there on behalf of Public Health & Social Services, who, like Wilkening’s lawyer, was arguing the examiner should uphold the original ruling. Russell argued that the child’s size would disqualify him from being able to carry out provocation.
“We have evidence that a 5-year-old, after at least a couple of days of being asked about what happened, admitted to slapping or shoving the dog,” Russell said. “Frankly, a 5-year-old being able to ‘provoke’ a dog to that level of severe injury is surprising. So, our assertion is … that couldn’t have been a reasonable determination.”
The hearings examiner, Centralia lawyer Mark Scheibmeir, posed to Russell that this case was a very unique situation and he was having a hard time understanding that a person could be disqualified from provoking a dog due to their physical or mental condition. When the attorney representing Wilkening was asked to give her statement, Scheibmeir again brought this up and asked if she felt a 2-year-old could provoke a dog.
The lawyer said it would depend on the facts of the case. The appeal, including arguments from all three parties, went on for about an hour. After considerable time spent hashing out all three arguments, Scheibmeir left the room for a few minutes of deliberation.
When he returned, he announced he’d uphold the original decision: Bull was not a dangerous dog. In this case, he said, Hornburg did not meet the county’s burden of proving that the dog hadn’t been “provoked” and suggested the humane officer had a stronger argument she could have taken.
“I should also add that no one protested the form of testimony below, which is all hearsay, we’re told, by parties who may have had some interest in the outcome and therefore, credibility issues and accuracy issues,” he said. “But none were protested.”
Scheibmeir continued, saying “Let me make clear that this is a tragic situation. But, its tragedy is not to influence the outcome. The outcome is determined by the facts, not the severity of the results.”
After the hearing wrapped up, Hornburg told The Chronicle she was unhappy with the outcome. While she understood the decision, she said she felt unable to do her duty to protect public health, emphasizing her disappointment in not being able to keep the child safe. In the future, she said she’d like to see more clear definitions around the term “provocation” in state law to exclude children under a certain age, similar to how children under the age of 8 in Washington cannot be charged with a crime.
