Vermont high court favors humane society

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1999:

MONTPELIER, Vt.– – T h e
Vermont Supreme Court on November 12
upheld a lower court ruling that the North
County Animal League, of Morrisville,
had the right to award a female German
shepherd to an adoptive couple rather
than to her former owners, Chasidy
Lamare and Charles Arnold of Wolcott.
The dog reportedly escaped
from a yard tether on June 3, 1997, and
was held for nine days by the Wolcott
animal control officer before being taken
to the League shelter, eight miles away.
She was there for four weeks before
Lamare and Arnold came looking for her.

By then the adoption to the other couple
was already in progress.
Represented by the Vermont
American Civil Liberties Union, Lamare
and Arnold claimed the North Country
Animal League discriminated against
them for socio-economic reasons.
The case was watched by animal
shelters nationwide. A ruling for
Lamare and Arnold might, in effect,
have set a precedent that all animal adoptions
are conditional upon an original
owner never turning up.