On 07/19/13 at approximately 1514 hours SPD received a call reporting a dog having been left inside a car in a local parking lot. The dog had allegedly been left alone in the car for at least 8 minutes prior to receiving the complaint. Upon arrival the officer observed a black Honda Accord parked in front of the building to the left of a Main Entrance. The officer noted that all of the windows in the car were down approximately 2 inches. Inside the car sitting in the front passenger seat was a white and brown colored Pitbull dog. The officer noted that the dog was panting heavily and was very obviously not comfortable. There was no one with the car, the car was not running and there was no water in the car for the dog. It should be noted that although the vehicle was partially parked in the shade of the building, the outside air temperature was 96 degrees via the thermometer in my patrol car (it later read 95 degrees after being parked in the shade for approximately 10 minutes). Based on common calculations for inside car temperatures, the temperature inside the car would have ranged from 114 degrees to 129 degrees. An unidentified female who was standing near the vehicle when the officer arrived she advised that she had gone to the different offices to see if she could find the vehicle owner but was not able to. Fearing that the dog faced serious consequences if not removed from the vehicle and provided with water officer decided to make entry to remove the dog. As he was was preparing to enter the vehicle the owner arrived. This was at approximately 1525 hours. According to the owner she had only been in the building for a "couple of minutes". When confronted about how long she had truly been inside she showed no remorse at all for leaving the dog in the car and made made several statements to the fact that she felt she did nothing wrong. The dog owner was issued a civil violation ticket in the amount of $386 for Neglect of Animal. The officer also forwarded a copy of this report to the Springfield Humane Society so they can follow up with the dog owner.
Posted on: Mon, 29 Jul 2013 20:48:07 +0000
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