Court dogs a burden on DeKalb’s overwhelmed shelter

Care for these dogs — whose numbers hit a high of 153 last summer — has become one of the biggest challenges facing the shelter, where health and safety conditions have repeatedly drawn state scrutiny and which is so overcrowded it is regularly euthanizing healthy dogs for space. Court dogs, even those held not for abuse but because they’ve been deemed dangerous, can’t be euthanized until the cases conclude.

Animal advocates say the dogs’ treatment is symbolic of the gaps in animal welfare throughout DeKalb County. While animal shelter overcrowding is a widespread issue across the Atlanta metro, DeKalb’s lengthy court stays are unique.

The court system is meant to hold owners accountable for the way they treat their pets but, instead, cases can languish without resolution or consideration for the dogs being held in a shelter that wasn’t designed for long-term stays.

The long stays amount to a second victimization, and many dogs are so traumatized by the time their cases are resolved they are not safe to handle and are, essentially, not adoptable, advocates and shelter officials say. Routinely, a dog will come off court hold only to then be euthanized, as was the case for dogs named Meryl Streep and Keanu Reeves. They were both put down about a month after their six-month-long court holds ended last November.

Credit: Miguel Martinez

Credit: Miguel Martinez

LifeLine Animal Project, the nonprofit that manages the shelter, has lobbied county officials for changes since early 2022. The dogs often face greater punishment than owners, LifeLine has argued.

“While the toll on shelter operations is substantial, the toll on these animals is, in some cases, irreparable,” LifeLine wrote to the county in October. “To keep these animals in the shelter environment for months and years because of the inefficiencies of an administrative process is singularly inhumane, and borders on unconscionable.”

LifeLine has pushed for ordinances that would require owners to pay impoundment fees, called for the creation of a task force to evaluate pending cases and asked the county to let the nonprofit act as the dogs’ legal representative. Magistrate court judges have added an impound calendar to review cases but county officials have not acted on any other recommendations.

Advocates say there’s no reason for the county and prosecutors not to utilize legal tools that would enable the dogs’ release sooner, particularly when the owners are repeat no-shows at court. They say officials have been slow to act.

“It’s a huge game of hot potato,” said Markie Campbell, who has fostered three sets of court dogs. “No one wants to take responsibility.”

Scooby and Dee

Campbell is a longtime foster for LifeLine with a soft spot for puppies. She hates watching them grow up in the shelter.

So when five puppies involved in a February 2022 neglect case came into the shelter, Campbell volunteered to take two and named them Scooby and Dee. They were her first court dogs.

Over the next several months, the owner missed a total of six court appearances. Campbell said the process was infuriating, a Groundhog Day time loop on repeat.

Credit: Miguel Martinez

Credit: Miguel Martinez

There was a different prosecutor from the Solicitor General’s office nearly every time, and their knowledge of the case seemed limited, she said. The case went before five judges total. It was as if the case was being heard for the first time every time it landed back on the docket, Campbell said. This, she realized, was common.

Meanwhile, caring for the dogs became harder as they aged. Court dogs can’t be altered, so Campbell had to separate the pair and find another foster because Dee couldn’t be spayed.

Campbell eventually began to push prosecutors to petition for what’s known as a motion to dispose — a legal order that would surrender ownership of the dogs to the shelter. Prosecutors are free to continue to pursue their case against defendants but these motions disentangle the dogs from the case and, importantly, make the dogs eligible for adoption.

Under state law, prosecutors can file these motions. DeKalb County’s attorneys can also file them, or they could deputize LifeLine to file them.

Instead, each office points at the other and says it’s their job, Campbell said.

In August 2022, six months after the dogs were impounded, the motion to dispose was granted. Dee was adopted by her new foster family immediately. Scooby was adopted in December.

Campbell was told her foster dogs’ case was the first in which motions to dispose were used to release dogs whose owners repeatedly failed to appear in court. Meanwhile, the case against the owner remains open two years later.

Court dogs 10% of shelter’s canine population

In foster care, Scooby and Dee were two of the luckier court dogs. Most are not as fortunate.

Most impounded dogs end up at the overcrowded shelter, which announced last September that it was euthanizing dogs because they had run out of space and couldn’t provide humane care.

The shelter is still trying to get its numbers down and sets weekly targets which, if not met, means dogs are euthanized. As of mid-March, there were 518 dogs in a shelter built for 250. LifeLine’s goal is 475, the number staff believes is the shelter’s maximum humane capacity.

Overcrowding limits how much attention any dog in the building gets but particularly hurts court dogs. Often they have behavioral issues and can only safely be handled by experienced staff, who do not have time to walk or play with the dogs.

The lengthy stays make court dogs, whose numbers topped 100 until recently, one of the biggest drains on shelter space and resources. They must be housed in non-public areas of the shelter and now occupy most of the kennels originally designed for medical isolation, making disease control throughout the shelter near impossible.

As of mid-March, 48 dogs in DeKalb’s shelter were on a court hold. Another 23 were in foster care.

It’s a different story in other metro Atlanta counties. Fulton County has 10 dogs on court hold and Cobb County has zero. LifeLine also runs Fulton’s shelter and acts as animal control there. That gives them greater involvement in the process, a spokeswoman said in a statement.

Credit: Miguel Martinez

Credit: Miguel Martinez

In both Cobb and Fulton, officials said there are efforts to get defendants to surrender their dogs sooner and keep them out of the court system entirely. Stephen Hammond, Cobb’s director of animal services, said they generally don’t seize dogs unless the owner faces felony charges.

“We’re not going to sit on it for a year, two years, while we’re waiting on court,” Hammond said.

If it becomes clear after 60 days that the shelter will need to continue holding an animal, Cobb County will file motions to dispose or ask the courts to require owners pay for shelter care, he said.

Advocates want consistency

Those steps aren’t routine in DeKalb.

“I look at process and procedure, and it’s just failing, failing, failing,” said Sonali Saindane, who for the last two years has attended most court cases involving dogs. Saindane also serves as chairwoman of the county’s animal services advisory board, which has made numerous suggestions for ways the system could work better, many echoing LifeLine’s recommendations.

Changing how the courts handle no-shows is one of the board’s top recommendations. The practice has been to reschedule such cases and give the owner another chance to appear. But even with a second chance, owners don’t always show up.

Saindane said she routinely sees defendants miss one court date after another, all while the dogs remain in custody.

Between 2018 and 2023, the average dog spent 37 days in the shelter system, according to a report from the animal advisory board. Court-held dogs spent almost nine times as long, for an average of 329 days. There are court dogs in the shelter’s system with cases that date to 2018.

Advocates would like to see prosecutors and county officials move faster to petition for the dogs’ release. The solicitor’s office, which prosecutes the majority of animal cases, says it’s not so cut-and-dry. Owners have a due process right to have their cases heard, said Donald Hannah II, a spokesman for the Office of the Solicitor General.

“As the prosecution office, we can never compel, urge, intimidate or force a defendant into surrendering their animal,” he said. “It’s an ethical standard.”

Questions around surrender also go beyond prosecutors’ responsibilities to try the criminal case, Hannah said.

Motions to dispose or motions for cost of care — the strategy advocates would like to see used — are civil actions. It’s the Solicitor General’s position that civil actions should be handled by DeKalb County attorneys.

The county’s law department declined to speak to how they handle cases, saying they do not comment on pending litigation or litigation strategies. The office did not respond to a question asking whether they believe it’s prosecutors’ responsibility or theirs to file motions to dispose. They also did not answer a question asking why the county has not given LifeLine the authority to file those motions on their behalf, as requested.

In a statement, the department said it works with county and prosecutorial representatives to assess when motions to dispose are appropriate.

“In these assessments, the rights and the action or inaction of animal owners are taken into account, as is the expressed desire of community members to minimize time that animals spend in the shelter in connection with criminal proceedings,” the statement says.

Saindane said prosecutors and county officials have been quicker to seek motions to dispose in recent months, a move she credits to the attention advocates have drawn to the fate of the dogs. But there’s little consistency to the cases. She’d like to see officials adopt a standard and commit to filing the motions after a certain number of no-shows.

And even when the motions are granted, there are still lags. It can take weeks for the orders to be made formal. A slew of these motions were filed in cases in late January and February but it took weeks for the orders to be made official. The signed paperwork came only after a volunteer sent multiple emails.

Credit: Miguel Martinez

Credit: Miguel Martinez

Five of those recently released dogs — Max Pain, Litzy, Katuri, Brazil and Legacy — had been in the shelter since December 2022. Court records show their owner missed at least six court appearances, even after a bench warrant was issued. The county didn’t file for the dogs’ release until Jan. 31.

Even then there were delays: The order was granted Feb. 21. The paperwork wasn’t sent to the shelter until March 14.

Now, the dogs are free to be adopted. Unlike many dogs who’ve experienced long shelter stays, volunteers say these five are in good spirits. Max Pain and Katuri have been adopted, and Litzy is in foster care now.

When Andrea Seidl took Katuri from her kennel on a recent afternoon, the stocky white and brown pitbull trotted confidently into the play yard and then immediately squatted to pee. Tail wagging, she chased the tennis balls Seidl threw and then retreated to the shade of a canopy.

When it was time to go back, Katuri stopped twice to pee again. She carried the ball in her mouth until she got back to the kennel, then reluctantly traded it for a chicken treat.

Then, she curled up on her bed and settled back into life in her kennel.

DeKalb County court dog cases

Ziv

Ziv and another dog, Orrelo, came into the shelter in June 2023 after their owner was charged with misdemeanor animal neglect. The owner has missed at least three court hearings. The county sought a motion to dispose in January, which was finalized in mid-March. Ziv is very anxious in the shelter and remains in an isolation room because staff believe it is less stressful than public areas, where people come and go. During a recent visit, Ziv played with a volunteer in the yard but remained reserved, with his tail tucked between his legs.

Breadstick, Demarvi and Jalexa

These three dogs were impounded in April 2023, part of a 15-dog case. A felony charge of aggravated cruelty to animals was pre-filed against the dogs’ owner, according to court records. The owner has not yet been arraigned. The dogs are being held together in two kennels that open up to each other. During a recent visit, two of the dogs laid together on one of the beds in the enclosure.

Lila Love and Ice Gladys

These two dogs were impounded in July 2023, part of a seven-dog case. Lila Love birthed five puppies in the shelter shortly after being seized. Their owner faces an assortment of misdemeanor animal-related charges, including neglect. She requested a jury trial, which sent the case from magistrate court to state court, where it remains open. The dogs are kept in separate kennels at the shelter. Ice Gladys was withdrawn during a recent visit and sat in the back corner of her kennel, while Lila Love barked and threw herself at the kennel walls — common behaviors when stressed.

Johnny

Johnny was born into the DeKalb County Animal Shelter’s care. His mother and eight other dogs were seized by animal control in February 2021 and their owner was charged with nine counts of animal neglect. Johnny was born shortly after, the only one from a litter of eight puppies to survive. The owner wasn’t arraigned for two years, court records show. In the shelter, Johnny deteriorated. He bit a volunteer whose injuries required 13 stitches and then later bit a kennel worker. The county filed a motion to dispose in January, but the shelter had already euthanized him four months earlier.

Credit: Courtesy of Markie Campbell

Credit: Courtesy of Markie Campbell

Dolce, Janet, Black and Coco

These four dogs were impounded in January 2022 and are currently in foster care. Their owner has been charged with misdemeanor animal neglect and requested a jury trial. But court records show the trial has been repeatedly continued because of scheduling conflicts. The owner is represented by an attorney who is also representing a defendant in the “Young Slime Life” trial in Fulton County, which is already the longest criminal trial in Georgia history and which shows no signs of being wrapping up soon.

How you can help

Many court dogs are eligible for foster care while the cases proceed. If interested, visit the shelter at 3280 Chamblee Dunwoody Road in Chamblee or go online to dekalbanimalservices.com/foster.

How this story was reported

This story is based on interviews with volunteers and foster care providers, in addition to a review of court records and county records obtained through the Georgia Open Records Act. A reporter attended animal court and visited the shelter to view the isolation rooms where court dogs are held. LifeLine officials allowed the AJC to tour the facility but would not permit photos of dogs on court hold.