The Lewis County Dangerous Animal Designation (DAD) board, a volunteer, quasi-judicial panel that essentially hears court cases about dogs, ruled three dogs to be dangerous last week for two separate attacks.
As defined by Lewis County code, a dangerous animal is one that inflicts severe injury or death on a human, domestic animal or livestock without provocation; or, an animal that has previously been found to be potentially dangerous that again aggressively bites, attacks or endangers the safety of humans or animals.
After the DAD board rules an animal is dangerous, the owner has 10 days to decide whether they’ll euthanize the pet or keep it while following a strict set of rules, including housing the animal in a code-complying enclosure with signs saying “dangerous dog,” always keeping a muzzle on the pet when in transportation and always having the animal under supervision of a competent adult, among other rules.
Last week, two German shepherds were unanimously declared dangerous for their involvement in the alleged killing of a neighbor’s dog.
On March 15, a Lewis County Sheriff’s Office deputy was dispatched to a property in Centralia for a report of a vicious dog. In the backyard of the property, in a neighborhood between Fords Prairie and Galvin, “Lula” the dog was dead.
Lula’s owner reported she heard “noises of distress” and found three German shepherds attacking her dog. As she went toward them, one of the three, who was pregnant, jumped over the fence.
Because it was unclear whether the “Mama dog” — as she was referred to during the DAD board hearing — was involved in the attack, Lewis County Civil Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Barbara Russell only asked the board to consider the status of the other two dogs, a 1-and-a-half-year-old female named Nova and a male of the same age named Shep.
The other, separate case was for Otis, a 5-year-old great pyrenees/anatolian mix from Salkum. The dog’s owners, John and Eva Cox, did not refute that Otis attacked their neighbors, a couple who were asked to feed the Cox family’s pig while they went on vacation.
The incident occurred off Spencer Road on March 17, when the neighbors entered the Cox’s property through a shared gate they’d built between their properties so their children could spend more time together.
The board listened to teary-eyed testimony from the neighbors on their experience bringing their child in a stroller onto the Cox’s property, seeing Otis on his way toward them and having to fend the dog away from their child. Both the adults ended up in the hospital after the attack.
Otis was trained as a livestock protector, Eva Cox said, and was not accustomed to being with other people. The day the neighbors came to feed the pig, Otis was apparently not within his normal, fenced pasture.
The neighbor who was injured most by the attack — whose name is being withheld from The Chronicle for her privacy as she required medical care from the incident — asked that the board not do anything to harm Otis. She pleaded that he instead be rehabilitated.
DAD board judge Chuck Snipes explained to the Cox couple and to the victim that the dog would not have to be euthanized because of the board’s unanimous “dangerous” ruling, just that the owners would need to work with the Lewis County Humane Officer to bring their enclosure up to code.
“It sounds like you guys have a good friendship,” Snipes said. “It doesn’t have to end. And the dog doesn’t have to end, either. It’s completely up to you.”
