COURT CALENDAR
From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 1993:
Humane Enforcement
Houston police and animal con-
trol officers on January 2 seized 16 pit bulls
at the scene of a dogfight––the fourth big
dogfighting bust in the U.S. in two months.
Simultaneous raids on January
1 7 netted 35 spectators at a cockfight in
Mossy, West Virginia, and five alleged
cockfight organizers in Gilroy, California,
where more than 500 fighting cocks were
seized. About 20 to 25 people evaded the
police in West Virginia, and an estimated 60
got away in California.
New York state police are prob-
ing the alleged poisoning deaths of 127 dairy
cows circa January 1 at the Eagle Rock
Dairy, near Oneida.
Scotland Yard is seeking a knife-
wielding “pervert, psychopath, animal
hater, or someone with a grudge,” who has
sexually mutilated 30 horses in southern
England during the past nine months. The
case parallels the plot of the 1973 play and
film Equus, based on a similar true story.
The Maryland Court of Appeals
on February 8 suspended attorney Stanley E.
Protokowicz for microwaving a kitten who
belonged to a client’s estranged wife.
Protokowicz was convicted of cruelty in
1992.
In recent animal collecting cases,
the Geauga County Humane Society in
Newbury Township, Ohio, was called upon
February 4 to rescue 80 cats left behind when
an elderly man was hospitalized; the New
York State Humane Association and
Mohawk-Hudson Humane Society rescued
16 cats, five dogs, and 24 birds from a
mobile home owned by Myrtle Janet
Dunham, 71, of Petersburgh, N.Y.; and the
Humane Society of North Texas seized 31
starving and sickly dogs from a mobile home
they shared with an 87-year-old woman and
her daughter near Venus, Texas.
Former Illinois wildlife rehabili-
tator Russell Rose on January 6 drew a year
on probation, 30 days work-release jail time,
75 hours of public service, a $200 fine, and
was ordered to pay court costs for keeping
wildlife after his permit renewal was denied.
The Illinois Department of Conservation has
cancelled the permits of 140 wildlife rehabil-
itators in just two years, leaving only 170
authorized rehabilitators in the state. Illinois
DOC spokesperson Carol Knowles said most
of the cancellations involved people who
used their permits as a pretext for keeping
wild animals as pets. Illinois requires reha-
bilitators to turn permanently disabled ani-
mals over to “public or state scientific, edu-
cational, or zoological institutions.”
Craig Eugene Leista, 31, of Vista,
California, drew a year in jail on February 11
from Superior Court judge Ronald Prager for
stomping a kitten to death. Vista prosecutor
Kelly Rand, 34, was profiled January 24 by
the Escondido Times–Advocate for her
emphasis on forcing animal abusers into
long-term counseling via stiff sentences and
long probation.
Activism
Chicago Animal Rights Coalition
cofounder Steve Hindi was charged with
criminal trespass February 7 for allegedly
trying to videotape a deer slaughter at the
Waterfall Glen Forest Preserve, in DuPage
County, Illinois. State game wardens are
trying to kill 250 to 400 deer they blame for
damaging trees, by luring them to baited
sites, entangling them in rocket-propelled
nets, and then shooting them with captive-
bolt guns. CHARC members have been sab-
otaging the baiting sites since January 24.
Earlier in the week, the Superior Court of
Pennsylvania rejected private complaints of
assault brought by Steve and Greg Hindi and
fellow activist Carol Seiler, after they were
roughed up while protesting against the
Hegins Labor Day Pigeon Shoot in 1990.
Crimes Against Humans
Anti-stalking laws now in effect
in 31 states are expected to give humane
enforcement a big boost by enabling police
to charge animal serial killers with a crimi-
nal offense against humans in any instance
where the killing may be construed as an
attempt to intimidate.
Gloria Lynn Trotter, 30, of
Grand Rapids, Michigan, pleaded no con-
test to manslaughter on January 5 for failing
to control her two pit bull terriers, who
fatally mauled her nephew, Derrick Goree,
on February 23, 1992. Trotter then said
she would challenge the constitutionality of
the 1989 state law that provides criminal
penalties for owners of dangerous animals,
on grounds that the law requires no proof of
criminal intent.
Maricopa Superior Court i n
Phoenix, Arizona, heard testimony
February 10 that Arizona Republic reporter
Don Bolles was killed with a car bomb in
1976 for writing about dog-racing scandals
involving the late liquor magnate Kemper
Marley. Marley resigned from the Arizona
Racing Commission six months before
Bolles’ murder. John Harvey Adamson,
serving a 20-year sentence for planting the
bomb, claims he received $7,800 payment
from Max Dunlop, 63, an associate of
Marley’s. Dunlop and co-defendent James
Robison are on trial for the second time for
their alleged part in the killing .
In a case watched across the
U.S., New Jersey authorities are trying to
decide what to do about Donald Chapman,
of Bergen County, a trapper alleged to have
a long history of torturing animals, who
was released from a psychiatric prison on
November 17, 1992, after serving 12 years
for kidnapping, raping, and torturing a 23-
year-old woman. Chapman is under con-
stant police surveillance for a variety of
behavior indicating interest in repeating his
offense. As a juvenile, in 1973, Chapman
was convicted of kidnapping and sexually
abusing three girls, ages nine and ten.
Superior Court judge Peter Ciolino on
January 21 sent Chapman to a mental hospi-
tal for 20 days, to be evaluated for possible
permanent commitment, but that outcome
was considered unlikely because Chapman
does not display classic symptoms of men-
tal illness.
Charles P. Rourk, 33, c h a r g e d
with kidnapping, robbing, and setting an
Afro-American man on fire January 1 in
Tampa, Florida, had a record for cruelty to
animals in Will County, Illinois. In May
1991, Joliet Animal Control seized four
dogs from Rourk; one died of starvation
within hours, while three others, all pit
bulls, recovered from near starvation and
were adopted out. Neighbors told the Joliet
Herald-News that Rourk bragged of break-
ing puppies’ necks with his hands and of
feeding live mice to pet piranhas.
Thomas Lee Dillon, 42, of East
Sparta and Pike Township, Ohio, pleaded
not guilty February 9 to committing two of
the five murders he is believed to have com-
mitted in Ohio between April 1989 and
April 1992. The prosecutors said they
would seek the death penalty, while the
FBI indicated more indictments would fol-
low, possibly in connection with two mur-
ders in Michigan in 1990, one in Indiana in
1991, and two in Ohio in 1980 and 1983.
Dillon, who boasted of thrill-killing at least
1,000 dogs, cats, and cows, is also suspect-
ed of setting more than 100 arson fires since
March 1986. Dillon disguised the human
killings as hunting accidents; eight of the
10 alleged victims were fellow hunters.
Alleged Mafia boss Anthony
Casso, a noted pigeon shooter in his teens,
was arrested by the FBI on January 20 in
Mount Cassio, New Jersey, ending a 32-
month flight. Now 52, Casso is charged
with commissioning 11 murders.
