West Winfield Man Shot,
Killed Dog, Troopers Say
WEST WINFIELD – A West Winfield man was arrested for allegedly shooting and killing a dog, according to State Trooper Aga Dembinska, Troop C public information officer.
Troopers responded to a call that Ronald R. Bronson, 62, had allegedly shot a dog on his property on South Road in Richfield Springs.
According to police, Bronson said his cows were running from a dog in the pasture, and Bronson allegedly fired a shot at the dog and missed, causing the dog to run out of the pasture. Bronson then allegedly located and shot the dog, killing it, then disposed of the body.
Bronson was charged with the misdemeanor from the Agriculture &d Markets Law of Overdriving, Torturing and Injuring Animals; Failure to Provide Proper Sustenance. He was issued appearance tickets to the town of Plainfield court on Sept. 2.
I want to thank the police and justice system for doing their job. Dogs may chase cows or cows run from dogs. I have had it happen with dogs chasing the cows and our dog spooking the neighbor’s cattle. You can scare them off the property and square up if any damage was done by dogs. I don’t want someone hunting my dog to kill it.
There are so many types of service dogs and that is separate of them being a member of a family. This is an angry guy and the word community contains the word unity. Thanks to this jurisdiction from boots on the ground to administration for doing your job.
Keep the dog on a leash! There is a national leash law for dogs
An animal harassing or menacing livestock, which is not under the control of the owner, under common law, has always been considered a fair target, in the interest of protecting valuable property, ones livestock. On a practical note, it is not always possible to identify the owner, if any, of the animal or animals creating damage. In addition to that consideration, dogs are known to “pack up” and chase and/or injure livestock. Some animals involved may be wild, feral, or hybrid. Even if this is not the case, even if a responsible party CAN be identified, assessing damage after the animal has been permitted to run amok harassing a herd is far from a sure path to being fairly compensated in a timely manner. And it would seem that permitting an animal to harass your herd would also constitute cruelty and torture of the livestock in question. This is NOT the same as torching someones cat, and should be a CLEAR EXEMPTION from Agricultural and Marketing Acts. The question of it being a “service” animal is absurd, because if it cannot behave or be better controlled than that, common sense says it should be de facto decertified anyway. This prosecution amounts to unjustly penalizing the “crime” of farming.