Mayor Miller: You have Imprisoned This Animal for 3 Years - Leave this Poor Man and His Dog Alone!

Dale Anne Freed Staff Reporter Jun 17, 2009

Death row dog learns fate today
Philip Huggins finds out whether city can appeal his pit bull's reprieve after a judge found the muzzled dog was not the aggressor in a 2005 fight

Imprisoned since 2005, Ginger the mixed-breed pit bull is on a reprieve from death row, awaiting results today of a Court of Appeal motion on her fate, says her lawyer.

The 7-year-old canine's owner will learn whether a three-judge panel is allowed to hear an appeal from the City of Toronto on a court decision that Ginger should not be destroyed after getting into a dogfight almost four years ago, says criminal and constitutional lawyer Clayton Ruby.

Ginger's misfortune began Nov. 29, 2005.

"My mother took her out for a 6 a.m. walk in the park," said owner Philip Huggins, 28, a truck driver for a graphics firm. "Ginger (a 69-pound dog) was muzzled and leashed. Another dog (Buddy, a 45-pound dog) ran over to her and started sniffing her. The dog bit, and went and tore (Ginger's) left ear, then ripped off her muzzle." Ginger bit the dog back, then bit its owner, court documents show.

(--continued from home page--)"Clearly she (Ginger) bit. The question was whether she was defending herself against another dog or whether she was the aggressor," said Ruby, who got involved in the case two weeks ago, encouraged by a member of the Banned Aid Coalition, a group opposed to Ontario's pit bull ban. Ginger was ordered held in custody by a justice of the peace in December 2005 and remained at a Toronto Animal Services shelter while her case wound through the courts.

In 2007, the city was granted an application to have her destroyed, but Huggins fought it. Two months ago, Ontario Court Justice Mary Hogan set the destruction order aside, stating her "concern ... that such a dog would be ordered destroyed in circumstances where the dog had no culpability whatsoever."

The judge offered the analogy of a burglar breaking into a home where a pit bull resided and the pit bull biting the burglar, saying it would be "absurd" to destroy that dog.

She also found the justice of the peace erred in his judgment in several instances, "the most significant example in his finding that the dog Buddy was leashed and the dog Ginger was not. Clearly the evidence was the exact opposite."

Last month, the city filed its motion for leave to appeal Hogan's decision at the Court of Appeal.

City of Toronto lawyer Kirsten Franz told the Star yesterday it should be "mandatory for the court to order the destruction once certain elements are found: that the dog is a pit bull and that dog has attacked or bitten a person or another domestic animal."

Franz admitted she's not familiar with Ginger. "It's more a legislative interpretation issue that we're concerned with ... we don't think she (Justice Hogan) interpreted it correctly."

Ruby has got what he termed an "illegal order" changed so the dog could be released to Huggins. The 2005 custody order, he said, was "beyond the jurisdiction of the city."

Click here to read the entire story online at thestar.com