Tougher penalties sought for harming pets during commission of crime

Associated Press

FLORIDA, N.Y.

When Denise Krohn came home to find her goldendoodle Kirby bleeding on the kitchen floor, she at first thought it was a terrible accident. But she soon realized that her home had been ransacked, and that her other dog, Quigley, was lying dead on his favorite blanket in the living room.

Burglars who tore through her hilltop farmhouse north of Albany made off with several televisions, a laptop, some cheap jewelry and change. And, police say, they apparently shot her friendly, goofy dogs on their way out the door.

“It was just a mean, nasty thing,” Krohn said.

A year later, the crime remains unsolved. But what bothers Krohn is that police told her that if someone is caught, they would likely get 25 years in jail for burglary, but no additional punishment for killing the dogs.

“It’s just not right,” she said. “I don’t care about the TVs and other stuff. What hurts us every day is losing our dogs.”

Krohn hopes to gain some measure of justice by making her pets the poster pups for New York state legislation that would make it a felony to harm a companion animal, even by accident, during the commission of a crime. Conviction would be punishable by a $5,000 fine and two years behind bars on top of the jail time for the burglary or other crime.