Beloved pet, fearsome dog: dueling images of a child's killer
- From: "tiny dancer" <tinydancer357@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 20 Mar 2008 11:44:35 -0400
"This is a family dog."
Bullshit. 'Family dogs' aren't chained to a pole in the basement for
upwards of 17 hours, on a four foot leash, no less. And 'family dogs' don't
have to be:
"kept muzzled or tied up when strangers were at the house"
Family dogs, by this age, are housebroken and socialized to whom ever visits
the house.
Beloved pet, fearsome dog: dueling images of a child's killer
Pit bull owner stands trial in son's fatal attack
By Richard Chin
rchin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Article Last Updated: 03/18/2008 12:17:19 AM CDT
A pit bull named Face killed 7-year-old Zachary King Jr.
But was the dog a "wild animal being confined in this basement in the worst
of conditions" or was it a beloved family pet, a surrogate brother to the
Minneapolis boy whom it attacked without warning?
Those conflicting pictures were drawn Monday in Hennepin County District
Court at the trial of Zachary King Sr., who is charged with second-degree
manslaughter in his son's death.
Hennepin County prosecutors said King, 31, knew the dog had a propensity for
vicious behavior and that he negligently failed to confine the dog.
When the boy went to the basement to play with the dog, he was met with a
"violent, vicious, brutal attack" by an animal that weighed almost as much
as the child.
It was "totally, completely avoidable and preventable," assistant County
Attorney Amy Sweasy said.
On seven occasions the dog had bitten people, including King's son, before
the deadly Aug. 16 attack, Sweasy said. She said King kept the dog muzzled
or tied up when strangers were at the house, but it was allowed to run free
among family members.
In the 17 hours before the attack, the dog was treated inhumanely, leashed
to a pole in the basement of the family home and deprived of food, exercise,
water or a chance to relieve itself outdoors, Sweasy said.
King's attorney, Craig Cascarano, said Zachary Jr.'s death was "a terrible,
terrible accident" but not a crime.
He said the fatal attack was "an unpredictable
bite by the family dog."
"The dog may have bitten folks before, but never like this," he said.
Cascarano said when the family got the dog as a puppy about three years
before the attack, "little Zach adopted that dog as his dog."
The boy had three sisters but no brother. "He played with Face as his
brother," Cascarano said.
"This is a family dog. This is a family dog that protected the home," he
said. "This is a family that could never anticipate a thing like this."
Police and animal control officers, called to the King house at 3530
Humboldt Ave. N., found blood splattered in several rooms, they testified.
They found the dog still leashed to a pipe in the basement. It was dead,
surrounded by a pool of blood and feces. King had shot the dog after his son
was attacked. Nearby was a hole in a sheetrock wall with blood smears around
it.
Minneapolis homicide Sgt. Nancy Dunlap said she thought the hole was caused
by the boy's head.
King dropped his head into his hands as prosecutors played a video of the
bloody scene in the basement.
Minneapolis animal control officer Tom Doty testified the dog was tied up
with a leash about 3 or 4 feet long. He said restricting a dog that way, so
it couldn't flee from a threat, would increase its likelihood to attack
something perceived as a threat.
The Hennepin County medical examiner previously reported the boy died of
blood loss and asphyxia associated with puncture wounds and lacerations on
his neck.
"He wasn't attacked. He wasn't mauled. Judge, this dog strangled the boy,"
Sweasy told Judge Kevin Burke, who will decide the case. King has waived a
jury trial.
"This was anything but a docile family pet," Sweasy said.
King's wife, Melissa King, testified the dog once bit Zachary on the lip.
But the dog hadn't bitten anyone in the year before the deadly attack, she
said.
She said she and her husband had discussed giving the dog away but mainly
because it was hard to house-train.
They decided to keep him because their son would be heartbroken without him,
she said.
"He was very close to Face," she said. "He always played with him. He would
sleep with him."
She testified she gave the dog food and water on the day of the attack and
that the dog was fed every day.
"He was our dog. We loved Face and Ginger," Melissa King said, referring to
another pit bull the family owned.
Two of Zachary's sisters, Dasia, 12, and Zatorri, 10, testified the dog had
scratched them. But they said they weren't afraid to be alone with it.
But Robert King, the father of Zachary King Sr., testified he told his son
to keep the dog away from him and told his grandson to stay away from the
dog while he was there.
"That was just my feeling about pit bulls," he said.
Joe Friendshuh, a fence installer, testified Face bit him in the leg June 9,
2006, when he was working in a yard next to the King home.
Friendshuh said he suffered a puncture wound and incurred $234 in medical
expenses. He said he filed a lawsuit that resulted in a $22,500 settlement.
His lawyer kept $7,500, Friendshuh said.
http://www.twincities.com/allheadlines/ci_8608206
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