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Lawyers for The Animal Law Center (ALC) have successfully called into question the City of Denver’s ability to accurately enforce its own ban on pit bulls. This achievement was the result of a recent ruling which determined that city officials had misidentified a boxer-mix as a pit bull. The case revealed the city’s reliance upon inadequately trained personnel and faulty evidence to identify breeds banned under its own ordinance 855. The implication is that hundreds of misidentified dogs may have been unnecessarily euthanized in the years since the ban has been in force.
On October 2, 2009, following city procedures for challenging a ruling that a dog is a pit bull and banned by section 855 of the city municipal code, Denver’s Animal Control division held a hearing during which Animal Law Center attorney and founder Jennifer Reba Edwards and ALC attorney Jay Swearingen successfully proved that Dexter is a boxer-mix and not a pit bull. With the testimony of UKC and AKC breed experts as well as prior breed determinations by four veterinarians, Edwards and Swearingen persuaded the hearing officer that the three “experts” used by the city’s animal control had misidentified Dexter’s breed. This ruling casts serious doubt on the city’s process for determining whether dogs in its custody fall under section 855, which in some cases may result in the euthanizing of the animal.
The case that led to the ruling involved Dexter, a boxer-mix, and his owner Kevin O’Connell, a resident of the Denver suburb of Thornton. Before a trip In July of 2009, Mr. O’Connell left Dexter in the care of a friend who lives in the city of Denver. While O’Connell was out of town, Denver Police Officers spotted Dexter on the patio of the caretaker’s home during an unrelated call. Misidentifying Dexter as a pit bull, the officers took Dexter into custody, saying he his breed was illegal within the city limits. When O’Connell returned to Denver a couple of days later, he found himself embroiled in what would be a two-month long battle with animal control over Dexter.
At issue was accurately establishing Dexter’s breed. Since 2006, when O’Connell first obtained Dexter, none of the four veterinarians who examined the dog identified him as a member of any breed banned by ordinance 855. However, seven days after Dexter was taken into custody, one of the city’s hypothetical experts examined him and concluded that he was a member of the pit bull breed, citing the dog’s broad chest, body and head size, among other characteristics inaccurately determined to be distinctive of pit bulls. Against this spurious conclusion, the Animal Law Center team sought the expert opinions of United Kennel Club (UKC) and American Kennel Club (AKC) certified dog show judges to properly identify Dexter’s breed. All three agreed that Dexter was a boxer-mix with no predominant characteristics of pit bull.
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