Bailey the kitty is back home after three days at the vet.
By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter
CENTRALIA – The Centralia Police Department is investigating an early morning attack on a pair of cats that left one dead on Ham Hill Road.
Owner Cheryl Oakley said she awoke to barking so loud she thought it was inside her house. When she went outside, she saw two dogs in her yard, one of them with what looked like a possum or mole in its mouth.
Then she realized it was her 9-month-old Siamese kitty, she said.
“I screamed at them,” Oakley said. “When I saw it was her, I screamed louder and they ran away.”
Bailey the young cat was covered in blood. Her companion Roscoe the tabby was nowhere to be found, she said.
The strictly indoor cats had apparently pushed through a window screen and gotten outside, according to Oakley.
It was about 3 o’clock last Monday morning.
Oakley said a police officer showed up, then left. Five minutes later he returned with two dogs in his car which she identified as the ones she’d seen in her yard, she said.
When daylight came, Oakley found Roscoe dead across the road.
By mid-week, Bailey was home from the veterinary clinic and on the mend. But Oakley is left wondering what will become of the dogs.
“I don’t understand why they brought them back to the owner,” she said.
Police issued a citation – a civil infraction actually – to Felipe Loa-Vargas for dog at large, meaning a dog caught roaming off it’s owner’s property. The fine can be as high as $250.
But an animal control officer with the city is investigating further.
Boe Wohld, as the city’s special services officer, has dealt with animals in Centralia for more than 30 years.
Wohld said maybe seven or eight times a year they’ll get a report of an unprovoked attack by a dog on a domestic animal that ends in death.
Whether an offending dog gets impounded immediately for killing has to do with whether the act is witnessed, he said.
He checked on the two dogs this week, and saw they were not only in their pen, but chained up inside it, he said.
The city code about dogs that bite is patterned after state law.
In general, a dog gets one “free bite”, Wohld said. After that, if it does it again, the “dangerous dog” rules kick in.
And that’s a big deal, Wohld said.
If a dog is designated “dangerous”, the requirements put upon the owner are strict and expensive, according to Wohld. So strict, that when it occurs, most owners choose to give up their pet, he said.
Wohld guessed there are only about four or five such animals living in the city.
Among the requirements, according to Centralia’s code, are being kept in an enclosure with a secure top, proof of special liability insurance and in some cases having to wear a muzzle when taken for walks.
The “free bite” pass doesn’t apply if a dog inflicts severe injury on a human or kills a pet while off its property in an unprovoked attack.
Bailey the kitty was lucky.
Although the veterinarian surmised she was violently shaken, while her hindquarters were trapped in the dog’s jaws, she had no broken bones and didn’t require stitches for the tears along her backside.
“If you saw her when I brought her in, you would not think she would have made it,” Oakley said.
The vet kept her for three days, concerned about a deep wound in her groin, and possible spinal cord injury, according to Oakley.
She was sent home Wednesday with antibiotics and pain medication.
Roscoe has been buried. This weekend Oakley planned to bolt the window screens so her kitty can’t escape again.
“What if it was a kid?” Oakley asks, and then teared up. “It was a kid. It was mine.”
Wohld expected the animal control officer’s investigation could be finished as early as Monday.
Bailey, left, and Roscoe, right.
Tags: By Sharyn L. Decker, news reporter
i am so sorry for your loss.
For the record , my cat was not killed by Pit Bulls , actually I have met some very nice Pit Bulls and amazingly enough have found their intellect to be quite keen.
As for ” your mom “, so if my dog wants to come on your property, and slaughter your cat who is on your porch feeding her new born kittens in front of the small children , on your acre of land, that is ok with you ???? Should I just be glad it was not the children whom were torn limb from limb ?? You mentioned retardation in your comment , I guess you are probably quite aquainted with retardation and I feel sorry for you. I never equate animals with humans although from your remarks the animals might win.
Oh ok Thumper’s mom!! haha. and i didnt read it. get your facts straight I Care!!!!
Reply to WhoCares–why are you even reading this if you dont care. Havent you ever heard of the phrase “If you do not have anything nice to say don’t say it at all”
Roger81, I agree with you pretty much completely, though I do think that a lot of it comes down to responsible pet ownership. If you ARE going to own an aggressive breed, it’s on you to take the steps to make sure nothing bad happens – BEFORE it happens. There’s a lot of ‘my dog would never do that’ denial.
Can’t argue with nature – I don’t think the issue is solely that of dogs going after cats, although I will note that the precise sizes are less clear than you might think. However, dogs will attack in packs, and will attack animals much bigger than them – sometimes solo. One of the dogs which has come onto my priority to try terrorizing my livestock and my guests has been a pug. I don’t think ANY of the animals (and certainly not the people) here are smaller than that; an aggressive animal not being controlled by its owner is still a problem.
There was another case in the news not long ago about violently aggressive dogs – the ones who attacked, killed and wounded a whole flock of alpacas on a neighboring farm. I still wonder what’s up with that case, after the guy and his girlfriend were arrested for breaking into the pound, receiving stolen goods, etc. Certainly didn’t seem to be taking the repeated acts into account much, did it?
@Roger81, do not single out “pitbulls”. any dog of any size or breed can be just as unfit to be a pet. i know more friendly pitbulls than i do small toy sized dogs. but i dont judge. 90% of the attacks that people say were pitbulls were not even in fact american pitbull terriers at all. there are tons of breeds that look similar to a pitbull. and its sad that APBT get the bad name because people like you judge them for being so called bad with children menace to adults and terrorize other animals. how about you bring your children and your pets around my 2 pitbulls and my friends pitbulls and we can show you how great and friendly they are. EVEN in a pack. they want nothing more than to lick you and play with the other dogs. just because you know a friend who knows a friend who witnessed a pitbull attack, dont judge the breed. judge the owner of that dog specifically for not giving it the love it needs and the training it needs.
this is retarded, they were not children they were cats. and dogs attack cats, its been that way since the beginning of time, and if those cats didnt hate you so much that they had to escape from the house maybe theyd be alive. i feel the owner should have gotten the ticket he got and nothing more…those dogs arent dangerous, they didnt attack any humans did they. and sounds like they hopped right in the officials car.
I wish the police would put more of their time into animal attacks/animal cruelty issues. There seem to be a lot of dogs in particular that just aren’t fit to be pets. Pit-Bulls especially. They are a danger to children, menace to adults, and they terrorize other animals. Not to mention the noise they often make when somebody just walks by. Unfortunately, these poor behaved dogs are usually smarter than their owners.
I also think that animal cruelty laws need to be much more strictly enforced. Anybody that intentionally harms an animal is a sick person with mental issues. I think if a cop ever witnesses somebody intentionally running over an animal with their vehicle they should arrest that person and try to get their license taken away as they don’t belong in a vehicle since they are using it for their own sick entertainment.
Finally, I’m sick of the lack of sympathy some people (mostly males with a sub 100 IQ) seem to regard cats with. A pet is a member of somebody’s family no matter what species it may be and as long as it is WELL BEHAVED none are worth any more or less than others. People with attitudes like WhoCares (who I’m sure fits right in with the sub 100 IQ club) make me sick.
Bigger animals eat smaller animals. It the way nature works. If your cat was bigger than you it would eat you.
So terrible. I feel for you, and for your loss. We had to have a word with one of our neighbors because one of their dogs kept coming onto our property. We have cats, but we also have poultry and sheep and in season, baby birds and lambs. Their dog kept coming onto the property and once even tried to threaten my mother. We finally told the neighbors if we ever saw that dog near our livestock, we’d shoot it, no more questions asked. They didn’t like it, but I guess they believed us because they kept it away for a while. Seen it wandering occasionally since and once in our driveway, but that’s all.
The laws on this are pretty lax, where I lived a man two doors down from me had a pack of three large dogs who came on to my porch and killed my Mama kitty. They ripped her out of a box with four new kittens whose eyes were not open yet. Two of my Grandchildren witnessed this as well as my son, his wife, and myself. The Mama cat had to be put down she was so severly injured. The man who owned the dogs had the attitude oh well its only a cat , the cops did nothing. I sent the bill which was several hundred dollars to the man as he told the cops he would pay. He never did. He was new to town and thought he was better then us hillbillies in Packwood , where I lived at the time. I called everytime those dogs came into my yard and the cops told me I had to stop that or video them for proof. It was awful and my Grandchildren will never forget it. I get irritated at the trouble the neighbors cats cause and wish the neighbors would clean up the mess they make but I would never hurt them , I tell ya though I sure wanted to hurt those dogs I was so afraid they would go after my Grandkids, that was almost ten years ago and I am still pissed off when I think of it so I feel bad for this lady and hope her children did not have to see this.
Wow, nothing better to report then about stupid cats!! SMH!!!