Friday, April 15, 2016
Staff report
warren
Local animal-rights activists are rallying behind proposed Ohio legislation that would explicitly make bestiality a criminal offense.
Though animal cruelty is a misdemeanor offense in Ohio, it is one of several states to lack a law specifically against bestiality.
Ohio Senate Bill 195, first proposed by Sen. Jim Hughes, a Republican from Upper Arlington, in June 2015 as a budget amendment, would prohibit sexual contact with animals that are either dead or alive.
The bill would make bestiality punishable as a second-degree misdemeanor. The offender also could be required to undergo counseling and forfeit the animal. The proposed amendment was referred to committee in September 2015.
Local advocates will petition in favor of SB 195 at Pet Supplies Plus, 555 Youngstown-Warren Road in Niles, this weekend.
Before proposing the budget amendment, Hughes tried unsuccessfully in 2011 to pass a stand-alone anti-bestiality law.
Area animal-welfare advocates say they were spurred to action by the case of a Warren man arrested this month after being accused of having sex with his dogs. He is being prosecuted on an animal-cruelty charge.