February 22, 2007
News that Albany Police DON'T plan to charge the owner of a pit bull that attacked a woman and her small dogs last week, is disturbing on many levels.
To begin with, their ridiculous rationale that in order to charge the owner of the dog, they would have to charge the victim's husband who shot and killed the dog. That, of course, just isn't true.. And why in the world would they even consider filing charges against a man who killed a pit bull that was attacking his family.
Secondly, their statement that the owner of the pit bull already lost his dog, so why charge him with violating the leash law?
The dog's death doesn't negate the fact that the law was broken when the owner failed to properly restrain him.
In fact, we are told by people in that neighborhood that the pit bull regularly got out of Roger Miller's yard. As recently as the morning of the attack, he was roaming the streets.
Albany Police said they cleared it with the DA, not to press charges, but DA, Ken Hodges told us that it is of course up to the police to decide who to charge.
David and Eloise Clearman, besides having been scared half to death, have incurred thousands of dollars worth of medical and veterinary bills.
This is just the latest example of Albany Police not enforcing codes.
You saw our recent reports on lack of code enforcement concerning Sunday alcohol sales and smoking inside local restaurants. This has got to change.
It is also important to stress this is criticism is not aimed our police force, but the leadership policies of our Police Chief James Younger, and no action is taken quickly, then the responsibility falls to our City Manager, Al Lott.
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