A good friend of mine is experiencing hell with one of her neighbors.
Background (kind of long, sorry):
They’ve lived next door to one another for about 8 years. Both of them have backyards that are fenced in. She keeps her yard work kept up and her house neat. He is an absolute slob to the point of near hoarding. His back yard is full of junk including two junker cars with no current tags. Another neighbor tried to get him in trouble for having the cars with no tags but the city says if they can’t see the tag from the street there is nothing they can do.
The issue my friend is most concerned with is his dogs. He currently has two but has had (no lie) up to 12 at one time in his back yard because he refuses to have them fixed. His gate is in disrepair and the dogs are able to slip in and out of the gate at will. One is a large mutt and the other is a pit bull.
Earlier this year the pit killed a stray cat in her front yard and a few days later killed a neighbor’s dog. Both incidents were reported to animal control and the police but both said there was nothing they could do if an officer didn’t witness it. Between five different neighbors animal control has been out for one issue or another over 40 times in the last 8 years but nothing is ever really done.
Now these dogs have been out in the mornings chasing a morning jogger and menacing kids who are waiting for the school bus. The jogger called the police but by the time the police come the dogs are nowhere to be seen and they claim that unless they see the dogs out there’s nothing they can do.
My friend has repeatedly talked to him about fixing his gate and he always says he will. Most times he is contrite but sometimes he is abusive and angry. She is concerned about the safety of humans and animals in the area as one of the dogs has shown itself to be mean.
Does anyone have any advice or thoughts that might help the situation? I don’t want to make this too long and would be happy to give more detail if needed.
What would it take to fix the gate? Is there any possibility that your friend could fix his gate herself? I’ll admit we’ve done that sort of thing in the past with neighbors who just never get around to correcting an issue.
(For example, our next door neighbors never trim the box elder suckers that spring up along our mutual fence line. Since they’re going to become trees that will destroy the fence, my husband has cut them down several times.)
WRT to the autos, I thought the law only required them to be currently tagged if they were being used on the roads. To my knowledge there is no requirement to license and tag cars on blocks.
THANK YOU! That was my suggestion and she thought I was nuts. Her father is really handy and could do it easily but she was afraid that the neighbor would flip out at them for touching his property if they did it. When her parents come to visit her Dad has tried to knock on the door to get him to come out and her Dad was going to offer to help him but in addition to being an asshole her neighbor is a coward and won’t answer the door.
I might tell her to write him a note and put it on his door and tell him that unless she hears from him that he doesn’t want them to that her Dad will fix the gate by a certain date.
He might appreciate it, or he might flip out - hoarders tend to be very protective of other people touching their stuff, even if the intent is to help.
Would the cops take action if you filmed the dogs attacking and then running back to his yard?
It might make sense to fix the gate, but in a way that’s easily reversible. I’m thinking something along the lines of a chain holding it closed, using a padlock that you leave the key in. Nothing expensive or overly intrusive, but enough to secure the damned gate until the guy sacks up and fixes it himself.
It’s also worth considering what the worst-case scenario is regarding his response. If he gets super pissed, what will he do? Maybe it’s worth just fixing the gate properly and letting the chips fall where they may.
I was under the impression that killing another owned dog is the kind of shit that gets dogs put down. How is that not the case here? If a person gets bitten, doesn’t the dog usually have to be euthanized, even if there isn’t an officer standing around witnessing the attack?
I’m thinking that the yard situation might be better dealt with by contacting someone in the city government regarding zoning or residential code violations. That seems to be one way the hoarders on those TV shows end up coming to the attention of the authorities that will actually do something.
And the humane society might be a better resource for the dog situation. Animal cruelty investigations probably go through them rather than the police.
Firing a gun within city limits at a place other than a firing range is kind of frowned upon, and someone will notice the bullet hole in the dog and get to wondering.
I would check your local laws and see what they really say about animal control, crappy yards, etc. Sounds to me like a bunch of lazy-ass cops in your area that just don’t want to do anything.
If it killed other pets and has menaced children the dog has to go. I had this problem with a neighbor dog that would jump my fence and be waiting for me when I opened the door. I carried pruners with me between the house and garage and would have used them if needed but it was a renter who moved out soon after it started. I was surprised at the non-plussed attitude when I talked to him about it considering the dog was snapping at the pruners from across the fence.
If the town has leash laws that require people to have their dogs restrained within their yard by a fence or tie-down, and subsequently require a dog to be restrained by a leash off-property, then anyone who finds a dog wandering at large is perfectly within their rights to lasso the dog and take it to animal control, or lasso it and call animal control for pick up. I understand one of the dogs may not be handleable, but I would seriously consider grabbing the friendlier ones and turning them over. Let animal control deal with the guy. They will most likely give the dogs back to him, but may possibly require the dogs to be spayed/neutered prior to release, and may at least fine him for violating leash laws.
In addition to seeing about him allowing his fence to be mended, these actions should alleviate a lot of the problem, aside from the eyesore at least.
You’d have to prove it actually killed something and was causing trouble
Cops don’t like “domestic” disputes like this. If the gate fixing doesn’t end the problem, take a camcorder and film the dog. Carefully document the recording times and such.
Then you probably are going to have to sue him in a civil court to get the issue addressed.
If you can hit people in the pocketbook they’ll change. Of course then for the rest of your time in that house, you will have to live with a major enemy.
I’d personally just trap the dog and take them far away and release them next to a city pound about 100 miles away so they’re caught or just tie them up in front of a city pound 100 miles away.
Yeah, the bit about the officer not witnessing it sounds like bullshit to me. People get arrested based on witness identifications, why wouldn’t that work for a dog? I agree with the suggestions to try to videotape the altercations with the dogs. You would probably want to check with animal control first to see if at least that would be acceptable evidence.
In my state, the law says that an officer may arrest, without a warrant, any person who commits any crime in his presence and any person whom he probable cause to suspect of having committed a felony not in his presence. So if the crime is a felony, a witness identification of the criminal can give an officer probable cause to arrest even if he didn’t witness the crime. But if the crime is not a felony, the officer would have to see the crime committed.
(There are some exceptions to the above rule not relevant here; certain misdemeanor offenses are subject to warrantless arrest even if the officer did not observe them. They include shoplifting, carrying a weapon on school property, assault and battery, and brandishing a firearm. I mention them here only to avoid a nitpick…)
I should also note in my state that any person may appear before the magistrate and swear to the set of facts establishing a misdemeanor crime, and the magistrate may then issue a warrant for the arrest of that person, or may issue a summons instead of a warrant at his discretion.
But they don’t need an arrest: the neighbor’s not going anywhere. They need a summons and/or an order to keep the dogs properly restrained.
But in the situation where police are reluctant or not coordinating well with animal control, my next step would be to call up my selectman/city councilman/Mayor and complain that the town isn’t doing anything about this situation ("Why is the town going to wait until somebody gets seriously hurt?’) That can often unstick town agencies enough to do something.