COURT CALENDAR

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1997:

Activism
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals unanimously ruled March 14 that the
U.S. Forest Service had no legal cause to conceal
the location of northern goshawk nests
from the Maricopa Audubon Society, of
Phoenix, Arizona. The Audubon group sought
the data in 1993, alleging that a Southwestern
region forester and his deputy improperly
ignored protection of endangered species. The
forester took early retirement and the deputy
transfered, after then-Forest Service chief Jack
Ward Thomas hired an outside consultant to
do a special inquiry––but the Forest Service
released only an edited edition of the findings.

Troy Gregorino, 21, of Twinsburg,
Ohio, a Kent State University journalism
senior and member of Campus Animal Rights
Expedition, drew 180 days in jail and a $200
fine, both suspended, after pleading no contest
to taking documents from the laboratory of psychology
graduate student Debra Vantilburg.
Vantilburg is studying memory patterns in eight
caged rhesus macaques.
Patrick Shipsey, 44, owner of a
960-acre private wildlife reserve and chief petitioner
for a failed Oregon ballot measure to bar
cattle from streams, faces trial soon in Grant
County for allegedly shooting 11 cattle belonging
to Robert Sproul, 82, last October, a
week before voters rejected the “clean streams”
initiative by almost a 2-1 margin. Shipsey’s
attorney reportedly seeks a cash settlement with
Sproul that would keep the case out of court.
Patricia Ann Thomas, 41, of
Tucson, drew 65 hours of community service
on February 26 after pleading guilty to illegally
feeding bears last July 4 at her cabin on Mt.
Lemmon. Foraging bears have attacked
humans in nearby tents and cabins four times in
two years. Brownie Jennifer Corrales, age 8,
suffered eye damage, and 4-H Club camper
Anna Louise Knochel, 16, was severely
mauled, in separate incidents less than 10 days
after Thomas was charged. The Arizona
Game and Fish Department killed three problem
bears on Mt. Lemmon during the summer
and relocated nine––after releasing eight problem
bears there from 1985 thtrough 1988.
Humane enforcement
Bruce Daniel Gallant, 45, a Motel
6 resident in Fremont, California, on January
15 drove his truck 50 feet through the front of
the city animal shelter after refusing to sign
release forms to reclaim his allegedly neglected
dogs, injuring an animal control staffer and a
police captain. Gallant then drove off, pursued
at low speed by two police cruisers, but hit five
cars at a red light, causing five more cars to
crash. Six people were hurt, none seriously.
Gallant adopted the dogs last year. The shelter
took them back on December 22.
Tim Hendricks, 17, of Stow, Ohio,
on February 7 sued Cuyahoga Falls patrolman
Richard Garinger and the city of Cuyahoga
Falls for alleged malicious arrest, for charging
Hendricks with cruelty last July 8, after
Hendricks drove over a wild mother mallard
and her three ducklings in front of Garinger.
Referee Jasper Liggins of Summit County
Juvenile Court ruled in November that the Ohio
cruelty statute applies only to owned animals.
Crimes against people
Testifying last December that former
junior hockey coach Graham Jones raped
him weekly for six years, Boston Bruins hockey
star Sheldon Kennedy said Jones first
attacked him at age 14, after showing off a
shotgun and talking “ominously” of duck hunting.
Jones drew 42 months in prison.
New York State Police say
Christopher P. Gilson, 58, believed to have
killed himself on December 29 in a hunting
accident in the Town of Halfmoon, sent a
Christmas Eve parcel bomb that burned Jordan
Reardon, 10, of Clifton Park, over 27% of
her body. Jordan’s uncle in 1991 fired Gilson
from a high-paying sales job, due to alleged
alcoholism.
Pit bull terrier breeder Rodney
Borushaski, 24, of Granby, Missouri, was
convicted on January 29 of killing his in-laws,
Bobie and Marilyn Blewer, at their funnelcake
stand at Iowa State Fair last August 12.
Borushaski drew life without parole.
Dennis L. Copling, 21, of East
Camden, New Jersey, was convicted February
5 of murder and manslaughter for shooting
Kirby Bunch Jr., 19, and Mark Sylvester
Winton, 30, over an allegedly stolen pit bull
terrier puppy.
Tracy S. Walter, 34, and Randy
Thomas, 35, of Colville, Washington, were
accused February 5 of tying James L. Peterson,
39, between trees in subfreezing weather
and spreading bacon around him to attract
predators, after a dispute of unspecified nature
arose while the men were at a remote site circa
2 a.m. with a 16-year-old girl. Walter allegedly
first tried to shoot Peterson.
Multimillionaire John E. duPont
may serve only five years for killing Olympic
wrestling champion David Schultz at his estate
on January 29, 1996, because a jury on
February 25 found him insane––in part because
he pointlessly killed animals.
Susan Zeff, 46, wife of Shoreline
Star greyhound track owner Robert Zeff, on
February 26 carried Fairfield County deputy
sheriff Richard Orr, 69, a block through
Bridgeport, Connecticut on the hood of her car,
hitting a pedestrian, after Orr tried to serve a
lawsuit on Robert Zeff in connection with the
track bankruptcy. Susan Zeff said Orr climbed
on the hood and wouldn’t get off.
A jury in Suffolk, New York on
March 4 found Kenneth Worrell, 23, not
guilty of killing Kelly Lewis-Purcell, 23, on
December 23, 1995, as they tried to jacklight
deer from a pickup truck driven by Daniel
Kart, after drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana.
Juror Cora Ress, 55, of Sayville, told
Newsday that there was no evidence that
Worrell fired the fatal shot on purpose. Worrell
allegedly shot at a deer from the bed of the
moving truck, hitting Lewis-Purcell instead as
he leaned out the window to fire from the cab.
Worrell said his gun went off by accident.
Curtis Lee Scales Jr., 45, of New
Orleans, a.k.a. Donnie Ray Burns, drew 18
months in federal prison on January 22, for
allegedly defrauding victims in seven states,
claiming he was a truck driver who had found
their missing dogs and needed money to send
the dogs home.