Dog Removed From Home of Cruelty Suspect

Responding to a flood of calls from angry dog lovers, police took a collie into protective custody on Saturday--one day after the dog’s owner was jailed on charges that he stoned and beat the dog while a neighbor captured the attack on videotape.

The dog, named Jazzy, was taken to the County Animal Control shelter in Orange, which also fielded hundreds of calls from people asking who was looking after the dog.

“The phone kept ringing and ringing,” said Fountain Valley Police Sgt. Keith Levin. “They were disgusted and dismayed.” The collie’s owner, Richard Eugene Griffith, Jr., 36, was released from Huntington Beach City Jail Friday after posting $5,000 bail. On Thursday, he was charged with two felony counts of cruelty to an animal.

Police said a neighbor videotaped Griffith as he sealed Jazzy’s mouth with tape and then beat her with a wooden-handled garden tool.

Griffith could not be reached for comment. His lawyer, Mark N. Phillips, declined to discuss the case.

Levin said Griffith cooperated with officers who came to pick up Jazzy shortly after noon Saturday from the family’s Fountain Valley home, and noted that the owner offered officers a leash for her.

The length of the collie’s stay at the shelter will depend on the outcome of the criminal case, Levin said.

He said the department decided to remove the dog from Griffith’s home because of the barrage of calls.

Those calls came from people such as Myrna Jorgenson, the owner of a German shepherd and a Lhasa apso, who spent Saturday morning phoning the police, animal control and the Humane Society.

“My concern was that it didn’t seem that there were any rights for the collie,” said Jorgenson, who lives in Corona del Mar.

Jorgenson said the news of the beating charges appalled her and made her worry about Jazzy’s safety.

“I thought maybe this man could come back to the home and maybe inflict more pain on the dog,” she said.

Authorities had filed the charges against Griffith in West Orange County Municipal Court on Thursday, alleging that he beat the collie “continually.”

Neighbors reported that the dog was left in the yard without shelter around the clock, regardless of the weather.

About two weeks ago, an anonymous letter had appeared in the neighborhood, asking people disturbed by the dog’s daytime barking to complain about the noise to the Griffiths, a neighbor said.