Community Corner
Veterinarian Plans Walk to Bring Justice for Dog Thrown From Moving Car
Dr. Lynda Loudon will walk from Montauk to Manhattan for benefit of Joey and other abused animals.
A veterinarian who rehabilitated an abused dog from the brink of death and adopted him is planning a run with the pit bull, Joey, from Montauk to Manhattan to raise awareness of animal abuse and to support new state legislation that would make it easier to prosecute.
"Joey was out into a black plastic bag, tied and thrown out of a moving car ... " Dr. Lynda Loudon recalled. "He was in a horrific state. He had three fractured vertebrae in his neck and was screaming in pain. If someone can do that to an innocent defenseless puppy, what else are they capable of?"
The dog was found in August 2012 after being thrown from the vehicle in Brentwood, and bite marks led his saviors to believe he had been used as a dog fighting "bait dog."
Loudon, who spent Fourth of July weekend in Sag Harbor with her family and Joey, said her trip across Long Island in October will also raise awareness of the need for money for urgent medical care for strays and other animals whose owners don't have the financial means. In addition to being the medical director of Nassau-Suffolk Animal Hospital in Farmingdale, Loudon is the founder of Healing Haven Animal Fund.
"My Healing Haven Animal Fund nonprofit is dedicated to providing funding for animals like Joey in cases where finances might otherwise dictate their opportunity to live and thrive, like Joey has," Loudon said. "It kills me to think there are more Joeys out there that are not getting the second chance the Joey got.
"This morning we are calling for the immediate capture of the criminal — the sociopath — who perpetrated an absolutely heinous crime against an animal," Farrell said.
Also during the press conference, Boyle announced two pieces of state legislation aimed at curbing animal abuse.
One bill would establish a state database of animal abusers, just like the Suffolk County animal abuser registry, which became the first such registry in the nation in 2010.
The second bill would recategorize animal abuse laws.
"If you think about a crime against a puppy, like Joey, where would you think it would be? In the criminal law — the penal law ..." Boyle said. "But that's not the case. What happens is, these animal cruelty laws go into the agricultural and markets law. It's confusing to law enforcement officers. It's confusing to prosecutors."
Boyle said that moving these laws to the penal law will make them simpler to enforce and prosecute.
