Suit Claims Pets Unnecessarily Killed : Animal shelters: A Canoga Park man says a stray dog was euthanized despite his promise to adopt it.

Charging that prospective pets are killed unnecessarily in Los Angeles shelters, a Canoga Park man and an animal activist organization have filed suit seeking changes in city procedures on when animals can be destroyed.

Jay Tell had sought to adopt a stray dog he turned in to the city Department of Animal Regulation’s West Valley shelter in Chatsworth last year but found it had been destroyed before he could do so, according to the Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit filed in August. Tell brought the suit with the Ark Trust, an animal rights awareness organization.

“I don’t want any other family to have the heartbreak that we suffered,” said Tell, a Tarzana coin and stamp store owner, who wanted to keep a stray golden retriever he and his three daughters found and named Magic.

“I don’t want any other innocent people to have animals wrongfully killed when the shelter knows that good families are ready to adopt them.”

Tell said he was not seeking monetary damages, but rather better safeguards to prevent what he called “either accidental or intentional killing.”

Robert Rush, general manager of the Department of Animal Regulation, said he had not seen the suit and could not comment on it.

But he said the department has a policy that works well for citizens who turn in a stray animal and request first rights to adopt it.

He said the department works hard to lower the numbers killed, which last year reached nearly 59,000 out of 90,000 animals impounded at the city’s six shelters.

Rush said department personnel mark a box on the impounded animal’s record noting whether there is an “interested party” to adopt it.

To help owners find stray pets, a list of stray animals is shown daily on cable Channel 35 and computer printouts are posted at each shelter.

Under current city procedures, healthy shelter animals are kept at least seven days before being euthanized, should no one adopt them.

On the eighth day, the interested party can go to the shelter and adopt the pet.

Department personnel will call that person beforehand if a veterinarian has determined that the animal is ill or unfit for adoption, department spokesman Dyer Huston said.

But shelter staff members usually do not follow up if the interested party fails to return, because of the high work volume and staff shortages, he added.

Tell said he was always an interested party, but city procedures did not protect Magic.

The dog he turned in had bitten someone in what he called a “freak” situation.

His 7-year-old daughter went to show the dog to a neighbor, who was mowing his lawn, Tell said.

But Magic suddenly bit the neighbor on the leg.

Tell said the action was completely out of character and theorized that the animal was frightened by the loud engine.

Although the bite did not cause a serious wound, the medical personnel who treated the neighbor informed Tell that the dog should be quarantined for 10 days to see if the animal had rabies.

Tell said he then asked animal regulation officials how to quarantine Magic, and took their advice by placing Magic in the Chatsworth shelter for 10 days.

Tell said there was never any question that he would reclaim the dog and pay a fee of about $50 to formally adopt it.

He said he spoke to shelter officials twice on the 10th day and made an appointment to pick up Magic.

But before he could leave the next morning to do so, he said, shelter officials called to say Magic had been accidentally destroyed the night before.

Later, he said, officials gave conflicting accounts as to whether the killing had been intentional or accidental.

Tell said he was so outraged by the department’s behavior that he sought out animal activist groups.

The case resulted in a protest staged outside the West Valley shelter.

Tell’s attorney, Arthur J. Cohen, said the suit was filed out of a belief that Tell’s experience was not an isolated occurrence but a common practice in city shelters. “It’s happening due to what we believe is either a negligent or a careless system,” he said.

Actress Gretchen Wyler, founder of the Ark Trust, said her organization has been gathering information on other similar cases.

She said she has located five other would-be dog or cat owners who also made their willingness to adopt certain animals known to personnel at both the East and West Valley shelters.

But those animals were also euthanized.

“There’s something wrong with the system,” Wyler said. “If there are homes, there should not be killing.”

Wyler and Cohen said other procedures they might consider are tags attached to dog collars, which the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals uses on stray pets turned in by people who want to adopt them.

Another possibility would be large signs stamped on impound tickets, a system the Los Angeles County Department of Animal Care and Control uses.

But Tell said: “You want procedures and safeguards and forms, but also people that will follow the procedures and safeguards and forms, people who care enough about people and animals that they don’t make mistakes.”