Dog fighting is a horribly brutal sport. Dogs have their tails and ears cropped short so that they can’t be grabbed. The dogs are taught to be dog aggressive, which makes rescue adoption difficult if the potential adopter has another pet. Some dogs who don’t perform well are used as baiting dogs. This means that the poor dog who happens to not be a good fighter is muzzled so he can’t fight back, while another dog learns to fight by mauling the poor defenseless dog. This builds the attackers confidence, they say. The animals are abused typically to make them meaner.

Unfortunately, dog fighting is big money and still popular (though illegal):

Police raided a rural house and found a blood-soaked dog fight arena where fans had gathered for a night of gambling with a winner-take-all pot of $50,000.

Officers arrested 123 people late Saturday on felony charges of cruelty to animals, dog fighting and commercial gambling.

Newton County sheriff’s deputies found one dead dog lying at the side of a makeshift ring, and another dog so badly mauled that it was later euthanized. Blood covered the walls and soaked through an old carpet.

“It’s hard to understand any crime, but to see animals used or I should say misused for someone’s entertainment like this is just pitiful,” Sheriff Joe Nichols said. “It just tears at your heart.”

Deputies seized about a dozen guns, several kilograms of marijuana and cocaine and more than a quarter of a million dollars, Sheriff’s Sgt. Mark Mitchell said. Deputies also found four trophies already engraved with the date of the fight.

Posted in uncategorized on January 20th, 2004 by SayUncle | RSS 2.0 |