Attack unleashes fear for pets

Roaming dogs blamed for killing napping cat

Wednesday, Nov. 30, 2005

Click here to enlarge this photo Brian Lewis⁄The Gazette Ralph Hurst with a photo of his cat, Jessie, who died last month after Hurst says two loose dogs attacked the pet.

But it was an unlikely prelude to a cat’s worst nightmare.

‘‘I didn’t hear any screeching or meowing,” said Ralph Hurst, who recalls seeing his 18-year-old cat snoozing on the porch of his Washington Grove home Oct. 19, shortly before he says two roving dogs attacked and killed his pet.

Hurst, a self-employed architect and nine-year resident of the small, wooded town near Gaithersburg, says he didn’t see it happen, but was inside later when he heard rustling sounds on his porch—like clawing on wood.

When he went outside, he saw two large dogs loping out of his yard. Jessie was gone.

‘‘After about a minute I heard a groan,” he said of the tan and chocolate-colored Himalayan who had belonged to his mother before she died. ‘‘It was pretty much him delivering his last breath.”

About a month later, Hurst went to a town meeting with the story of Jessie detailed in a written statement, which when read aloud by a neighbor inspired gasps and triggered a swirl of questions over town safety and the responsibilities of pet ownership.

Some residents asked what Washington Grove could do, what the county’s involvement should be and if Mayor John Compton should write a letter pressuring the dog’s owner to rein in his pets.

Others just shook their heads.

It was ultimately decided to appoint a resident to investigate what the county police’s Animal Services Division had done—or planned to do—and to find answers to residents’ other questions.

The resident, Peggy Odick, a volunteer with the county Humane Society, says she has arranged to meet Dec. 8 with Jack Breckenridge, an Animal Services officer, to offer ‘‘assistance in navigating the town,” a web of narrow roads and pathways traversing heavily wooded neighborhoods.

Hurst and Mayor Compton learned of the meeting from The Gazette and said they’d likely attend.

Breckenridge was not available to comment, but Steve Bartlett, field services supervisor with Animal Services, confirmed that Breckenridge was planning to meet with Odick Dec. 8 and said the officer had tried several times to issue a citation to the dogs’ owner.

The dogs’ owner did not return several telephone calls.

‘‘We’re still trying to catch the guy at home,” Bartlett said, adding that they’d try ‘‘a couple more times” before sending the citation via certified mail and then, failing that, getting the county attorney involved.

Meanwhile, it’s been more than a month since Jessie died, and Hurst, who has left half a dozen messages with Breckenridge but has not spoken to him in weeks, is beginning to grow impatient.

‘‘Jeez, it’s been a month now,” Hurst said Monday. ‘‘I was just hoping for a little feedback.”

After walking out on his porch to investigate the rustling sounds and hearing the groan that was Jessie’s final breath, Hurst saw that his cat had climbed onto a tree limb, about 10 feet from the ground.

The cat looked ‘‘scuffed up,” he said, and likely darted up the tree to escape the dogs. But it was too late. Seconds later, Jessie fell from the limb to the ground. He was dead.

‘‘His eyes were rolling back in his head and his mouth was open,” he said. ‘‘I didn’t see any blood or anything like that.”

Compton, the mayor, has been reluctant to get involved in the matter because until the town updates its municipal infractions ordinance—which it’s working on now—there will be no way to levy fines or otherwise punish owners who fail to keep wayward pets at bay.

‘‘That would be something for the future,” Compton said of the town imposing fines for such an infraction.

But an updated county animal control law, set to take effect Dec. 27, will apply to the town regardless of its internal matters, Compton said.

‘‘An owner must prevent the owner’s animal from having unwanted contact with a person or another domesticated animal at all times,” a copy of the law states.

Devon Cohen was the neighbor who read Hurst’s statement after he had to leave the November town meeting early, an opportunity she took to voice her own concerns.

‘‘When you have a pet, there are certain responsibilities you have, not only to the pet but to the people around you,” said Devon, who has lived in the town with her husband, John, since March 2004 and has two dogs and two cats.

The Cohens live close to both Hurst and the dogs’ owner and have seen the dogs around town. Devon said they’re concerned that such an attack could occur again, and might involve a child next time—or one of their pets.

‘‘We didn’t let (our cat) out for two weeks after the incident,” Devon said.

Kathy Lehman, a resident and the town clerk, said she’s also seen the dogs roaming around town, and that in light of the incident, she’s glad she keeps her two cats indoors.

‘‘I’m appalled,” Lehman said. ‘‘It was in the cat’s own yard.”

Hurst says he’s spoken to the dogs’ owner, who he said offered his apologies and asked if there was anything he could do.

But Hurst doesn’t want revenge or harsh punishments. All he wants is the owner to keep his dogs at bay.

‘‘My interest is not in having the dogs euthanized and taken down,” he said. ‘‘I’m interested in making sure they be kept up so this doesn’t happen again or to a small child.”