Blind plead for a law to protect '

Blind plead for a law to protect 'eyes'
By Dennis Romboy Deseret News staff writer

Thomas Hutchinson stood helplessly as a pit bull attacked his guide dog during a recent Sunday morning walk in his Ogden neighborhood. "Once the dog latched on, it was there for three minutes. All I could hear was Kalee screaming. There was no growling from the other dog. I was screaming for help. It took three men and a broomstick to get the dog released," he said. Kalee, a 3-year-old yellow Labrador retriever, suffered a puncture wound to the neck and a nick to the ear, requiring a drainage tube and four stitches. Animal control officers took the pit bull to a shelter. The passive Seeing Eye dog has recovered physically from the Oct. 10 ordeal, but Hutchinson is worried about her psyche as well as his own. If Kalee is afraid of being on the street, she's not going to take into account her master's safety. "I can't go out in my environment without being concerned about what lies around the next corner," Hutchinson said. Hutchinson, 29, couldn't do anything about the roaming dog that went after his dog. Nor will he likely be able to stop confrontations altogether. But the Weber State University student believes a law protecting service dogs from "aggressive dogs and inconsiderate humans" would be a deterrent.

Hutchinson and his wife, Christine, who also is blind and has a guide dog, are urging the state to adopt a statute that makes it unlawful for people to allow their dogs to injure or kill a Seeing Eye dog on duty. They also want it to be illegal for people to obstruct or intimidate a guide dog or its owner. Violators should be fined at least $1,000 or face a year in jail, and offending dogs should be destroyed, he said. A law, Hutchinson said, would alert people to the terror loose dogs cause for people who depend on canine companions to get around.

Sen. Ed Allen, D-Ogden, is having a bill drafted for the 2000 Legislature to stiffen penalties for stray dogs that go after Seeing Eye dogs. "We want to discourage that kind of thing as much as we can. It's a very serious problem because they (blind people) rely so much on them. Just imagine if you're blind and your dog runs off or is attacked. You've lost your eyes," Allen said.

Rhonda Clark, vice president of the Utah Council of the Blind, knows firsthand what it's like. Her yellow Lab/golden retriever mix, Blanche, was jumped by two Dobermans and a Rotwiler last November. Clark, who had obtained the dog nine days earlier, was on a training walk with an instructor at the time. Blanche never recovered emotionally and had to retire, as 95 percent of guide dogs do after an attack. "It totally freaked her out, because guide dogs are not trained to be aggressive," Clark said. "I tried to put the harness on her, and she would lie down. Her body would shake, and she just couldn't do it." Losing Seeing Eye dogs puts a lot of expensive training to waste, she said. Teaching a dog to be a guide runs about $50,000 from start to finish. Blind people typically receive some financial assistance from community service organizations so they don't have to pick up the entire cost, Clark said.

The Utah Council of the Blind has mounted a letter-writing campaign urging lawmakers to enact a service dog protection law. "I think that people need to be responsible for their animals. It seems like the only way they can do that is to create a law," Clark said. "A dog is our transportation. It's our eyes. Somehow those animals need to be protected."