Film With Bite : Police Crank Out a Video on the Rights of ‘Service Dogs’

Scene one, take one. Interior, Academy Cafe. Lunchtime. Action. Manager bites dog, dog calls cops. Cut.

“I’m not believing it, that’s the problem,” critiques the director, the man with a script and a badge.

It isn’t Art, but it doesn’t have to be. It’s the Law.

At the Los Angeles Police Academy this week, a squad of policemen-filmmakers have assembled a training video--coming soon to roll-call squad rooms near you--to acquaint police with the legal rights of trained “service dog” companions to handicapped and deaf people.

It’s State Law

For more than five years, state law has required--at the peril of a $250 fine--that public places such as restaurants admit such dogs, just as they would seeing-eye dogs.

But in California, “on at least two occasions I know of and probably more I don’t know of, the police officers didn’t know of the code, and actually told the people they had to leave because they were disturbing the peace. They actually removed the people in their wheelchairs,” said wheelchair-bound Kerry Knaus, regional director of Canine Companions for Independence (CCI). Her gray-muzzled, 12-year-old Labrador retriever, Abdul, is one of the oldest alumni of the CCI training program.

And once L.A.’s finest were acquainted with the problem, they proposed the Hollywood solution: “They said, ‘Oh, let’s make a film,’ ” Knaus said.

So on a warmish afternoon at the Police Academy coffee shop, the film crew from the training division--which had just called it a wrap on a segment entitled “Electric Shotgun Rack”--was ready to roll the tape on “Service/Companion Dogs.”

“This is a take, quiet please,” ordered officer-director Frank McGinnis.

Action.

Into the restaurant rolls Janet Dillingham, a Glendale, Ariz., woman. At the side of her wheelchair is Abby, her trained golden retriever, who has “given me back my freedom,” Dillingham said.

But for dramatic purposes, Abby is in the doghouse. She lies beneath the table, and as Dillingham chats with Diana Brookes--the volunteer who trained Abby--the menacing shadow of the restaurant manager looms.

Actually, it required three takes to get a really good menacing shadow. Officer Terence Cleary, also the scriptwriter, swings with relish into his “heavy” role.

“I’m Mr. Barnes, the manager of this restaurant,” he announces, “and your dog (a fine frisson of contempt in his voice here) is going to have to leave.”

Cavalry Rescue

McGinnis stops him. “Restaurant people, the manager especially, have to come off a little more PR, maybe a little more apologetic,” he instructs Cleary. “ Then you can become a little more officious when she says the dog can stay.”

Cleary tries again, more politely.

“Abby here is not an ordinary dog,” Dillingham responds, and explains the law. She has gone through this before, in real life; she hardly needs a script.

“Well I haven’t heard about that law, and I’m going to have to call the police,” Cleary says.

Five takes later, they are ready for the cavalry rescue: Officers Dave Harris and Ken Klein (who will later be taped in a squad car sequence, answering the “call”).

Cleary, the manager, explains the problem. Dillingham explains the law. Harris nods and turns to Cleary. “By law, she has the right--”he begins, then breaks up laughing.

Cleary is making funny faces, he accuses. Cleary mugs, and shrugs innocently.

By now, the only actor still in character is Abby, who has fallen asleep on the floor.

At the fourth take, they have it. “Sir, by law, she has the right to be anyplace the public is welcome,” Harris warns the manager, who apologizes, and Dillingham answers, “I understand.”

Awareness Campaigns

Perhaps not all the time, but often enough to require awareness campaigns like this one for the 500-plus service dogs now at work in California, as well as hundreds more guide dogs for the blind.

Despite the law, Californians and their trained dogs have been barred from places as varied as a Mexican restaurant, a convention center and a Santa Monica apartment.

“I think it happens fairly frequently . . . hearing impairment is considered, quote, the invisible handicap,” said Becky Woodruff, who trains service dogs at San Francisco’s Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

Some owners carry ID cards for themselves and their dogs, or laminated, wallet-size copies of the Penal and Civil codes to show, “if they’re stopped, to more or less try to educate the manager.”

‘Specialty Dog’

It is even harder for people such as Vickie Boynton of Santa Maria and her “specialty dog,” Brian. Boynton has hearing and balance problems but looks as fit as a tennis player; a second segment of the police video shows Brian alerting Boynton to traffic dangers she cannot hear.

Like every director, McGinnis wants his picture--which should soon be available to police departments statewide--to say something to people.

Said McGinnis modestly, “We just want to prevent anything (like the restaurant incident) from happening.”