Emotions High as L.A. Canine Court Settles Disputes

James T. Connelly, the judge, has just about had enough. Testimony has dragged on for days and there is no end to the legal wrestling, with each side challenging one arcane detail after another.

Once again, Connelly interrupts the questioning of a witness. “I really don’t understand the purpose of such excruciating details,” he says, chastising the prosecutor. “We could go on forever. This hearing has to end sometime.”

The acrimony is typical of any fiercely fought trial. But in this case, only the defense attorney is a legitimate member of the bar. The judge, the prosecutor and several of the witnesses are all animal control officers.

Court is in session. Canine court, that is. And the topics can range from, in this case, nasty maulings to complaints about yapping Yorkies or wayward boas.

Connelly is one of three Los Angeles city animal hearing examiners who preside over contested cases of nuisance and potential danger involving animals. The cases--and there were nearly 600 last year--are heard at two “courts” in North Hollywood and one near downtown.

It may be the lowest level of jurisprudence in America, but there is nonetheless an air of gravity to the proceedings.

The hearings, which typically average four to six hours each, are tape-recorded and transcribed, and a recommendation for action is forwarded by the examiner to the department’s general manager.

Although proceedings before the canine court carry no civil or criminal penalties, rulings can lead to execution of pets or their banishment from the city and orders banning people from owning pets for as long as three years. On a lesser scale, remedies can be as simple as ordering owners to keep pets indoors or to build better fencing.

Connelly’s court is a tiny room tucked into a corner of the East Valley animal shelter in North Hollywood. The brick walls are painted a soft rice paper yellow; appointments include a desk, a tape recorder, a dozen timeworn chairs, a coatrack and a bulletin board with a warning poster: “Making Threats Is No Joke.”

A wood plaque with the department’s insignia hangs on the wall behind Connelly. Proceedings are governed by the city’s evidence code, which exempts the canine court from strictly adhering to legal technicalities. Still, testimony presented could become important in a subsequent civil trial. Thus it is not unusual for attorneys to undertake legal maneuvers so complex that at times hearing examiners are forced to turn to the city attorney’s office for advice.

At the start of each day of trial, witnesses are sworn in, then excused from the hearing room to wait in the shelter’s lobby until called.

In the case currently before him, the defendants are two 3-year-old pit bulls named Sassy and Sarge, who are not present for the hearing and remain locked up in separate cells at a city animal shelter. The dogs are accused of the brutal mauling in February that left Acension Cervantes, 40, a Sylmar landscape worker, severely injured and scarred.

The dogs face a maximum sentence of death by lethal injection. The owners, Pamela Joyce Curry and her husband, Michael Tatum, could be barred from keeping pets for three years. But Curry and Tatum say they are no longer the owners, having given the dogs away to two unknown passersby the night before the attack.

A separate civil suit seeking unspecified and punitive damages has been filed in Superior Court against Curry and Tatum and their landlord, who owned the property where the dogs lived before the attack.

In the Tatum case, Connelly often finds himself defending his rulings on technical challenges from defense attorney Rhonda L. Hogg of Simi Valley.

At one point after a scrappy exchange, Connelly tersely warns Hogg: “Be careful about what you’re saying. You’re compromising my integrity.” He then calls for a 10-minute recess to cool tempers.

“There is a lot at stake for the principals,” Connelly explains later.

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A 20-year department veteran who has served as a hearing examiner since the program’s inception, he is used to the challenges. The Tatum case, he says, “is one of the more serious cases and a lot of different legal issues have drawn it out.”

Connelly is expected to make a recommendation in June and then department general manager Dan Knapp can follow or modify that.

There is more documentation to be submitted in the case. The trial consumed six days of testimony and meticulous questioning over a stretch of more than a month--the longest hearing ever conducted by the Los Angeles Department of Animal Services since the program began in 1987.

A courtroom similar to the one in North Hollywood is at the North Central animal shelter in downtown Los Angeles, where Ted Berquist, a 25-year department veteran, serves as hearing examiner. A third examiner was appointed by the general manager in March, and is temporarily working out of the East Valley shelter until a new shelter with a hearing room is built in South-Central Los Angeles.

Hearing examiners originally handled all complaints about barking dogs and dangerous animals. But several years ago, the department tapped into the Dispute Resolution Program of the city attorney’s office, which trains volunteers to mediate disagreements before they reach the court system.

Volunteer mediators now conduct the initial hearings on barking dogs, but their decisions can be appealed to the canine court.

Last year, the number of complaints to the city department about barking dogs increased by 50% over the previous year to 2,394. Most cases are resolved after the department sends warning letters to owners, usually within 15 days.

But if the problems continue, as they did in 850 cases last year, neighbors can request mediation meetings, which take another six weeks. About a third of those go on to an administrative hearing, which can result in a delay of a year or more.

“Quite frankly, the hearing process is ridiculous,” said Knapp. “To take one year to resolve a barking dog case” is incredible.

Despite the quasi-judicial surroundings, the intensity of emotions in canine court are often as dramatic as those in any television script.

“Whenever you get animals involved, people are really attached and sensitive because many consider their pets to be members of the family,” Connelly said.

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The scientific term for it is anthropomorphic--giving human qualities to animals. “That can lead to problems,” said Connelly, citing, for example, typical reactions among men ordered to have their dog neutered to modify behavior.

“They think in terms of themselves--how devastating that would be,” said Connelly, who estimates that about half a dozen times a year emotionally explosive owners have to be escorted from the canine courts by uniformed officers.

“That’s why we counsel people right at the beginning--what will be expected and what will not be tolerated,” Connelly said. “People need to keep a cool demeanor.”