Brody the dog is put down after 2-year legal battle in Minnesota

Brody the dog is dead, despite his owner’s desperate two-year legal battle to save his life.

“The dog was euthanized today,” Police Chief John Swenson of Lino Lakes, Minn., said in an email to the Los Angeles Times on Friday.

The Minnesota Supreme Court had ruled this week that Lino Lakes could euthanize Brody, overturning a state appeals court. The city said Brody bit multiple people unprovoked and posed an ongoing danger to the community.

Lino Lakes tried to euthanize Brody two years ago, but the death sentence was on hold pending an appeal by the dog’s owner, Mitchell Sawh.

Sawh told The Times that he visited Brody on Thursday, told him goodbye and said he would see him in heaven. He called the retriever-Rottweiler mix a lovable, peaceful dog that had been misunderstood.

After being informed that Brody was dead, Sawh said, “I don’t know what to do now.”

Sawh had held out hope that the city would allow Brody to go to a special shelter or sanctuary. He said the injuries Brody caused weren’t serious and the dog was either playing or provoked.

Swenson said Thursday that Brody had bitten three people without provocation at the veterinarian clinic where he was housed during Sawh’s appeal. Swenson said those bites were in addition to three “significant bites” Brody inflicted on people that led to the decision to euthanize him.

A state appeals court had overturned Brody’s death sentence last year, saying Sawh’s right to procedural due process had been violated. But when the state Supreme Court disagreed, Brody’s fate was sealed.

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