What you can do:Write a letter to the editor: http://www.gjsentinel.com/opin/content/news/opinion/includes/letter_editor.html or letters@gjds.com Letters should be 300 words or fewer. Always include your complete contact information.Contact Judge Jason Jovanovich (be polite!)
“If I had a big red button right here that would kill all the pit bulls, I wouldn’t hesitate to press it,” Judge Jason Jovanovich said Wednesday before he sentenced the owner of the pit bull that attacked an elderly Silt woman several times in September.
“I think they should be as illegal as owning a lion, and they belong in zoos,” Jovanovich said.
Pit bull owners who claim the dogs are just as docile as any other dog “are as high as a kite if they think they’re safe,” the judge said. “Most of the bite victims that come before this court are the dogs’ owners. I love animals, but I wouldn’t hesitate to order them all killed if I could.”
Julie Dawn Sullivan, 32, of Craig, lived near Silt and owned a pit bull, named Butterbean, which attacked Judy McGruder, 74.
Jovanovich sentenced Sullivan to pay restitution to McGruder, serve a year of unsupervised probation, perform 48 hours of community service and pay $250 in fines plus court costs.
Sullivan had earlier pleaded guilty to a dog license violation but pleaded not guilty to ownership of a dangerous dog inflicting bodily harm. Under the terms of a plea agreement with prosecutors, Sullivan on Wednesday pleaded no contest to the class 2 misdemeanor charge.
McGruder told Jovanovich she still has gashes and cuts to her left hand and arm, along with a severed muscle that prevents her full use of her fingers and hand.
“It was very vicious,” she said. “My head still isn’t healed, either. It felt like somebody was shooting me with a gun.”
McGruder was attacked four times by the dog, after she asked a man at Sullivan’s house for directions to a nearby house to pick up her grandson. As she walked back to her car, the dog attacked her from behind, knocked her to the ground and caused injuries that required four hours of surgery and hundreds of stitches.
Butterbean was euthanized, with Sullivan’s permission, shortly after the incident.
Sullivan told Jovanovich before she was sentenced that she was sorry McGruder had been attacked.
“I don’t want her to think I take what happened lightly, because I don’t,” she said. “I called her after she got out of the hospital and offered to help, but she declined, and I understand that. I just wish it had never happened.”
Jovanovich said he knew Sullivan didn’t intend to injure McGruder, but Sullivan was responsible.
“These dogs are like sharks, and I think they’re as dangerous as a loaded gun on a mantle,” Jovanovich said. “I do not see you as a bad person, but God forbid if this had been a little 5-year-old girl.”http://www.gjsentinel.com/news/content/news/stories/2006/12/06/12_7_1a_Pit_bull.html