Dog not Dangerous

To the Editor:

(Town of Sullivan, NY- Dec. 2014) I was very disappointed by not only the article about neighbors filing dangerous dog complaints against each other, but with the Sullivan Town Board meeting itself. The agenda was dog control issues in our neighborhood but instead turned into a personal attack on my family and our dogs.

Terry Eckert had an issue with one of my dogs on Easter Sunday, which was resolved in court. She did not file a complaint for six weeks, perjured herself in writing and on the stand and admitted in court that she didn’t even know I had another pit bull. Since discovering his existence, she has had an agenda to have him deemed dangerous just because that is what she wants.

Terry Eckert charged this dog with hers, trying to incite an attack. She was not attacked. She had Maureen Wafer waiting nearby with a cane for her screams to make this look like an attack. Her statement of injuries being worse without her having worn boots is nonsense. She was kicking my dog in the face with her boots. Maureen Wafer does not use a cane and couldn’t possibly have grabbed one and gotten to the scene of the incident in 10 seconds.

For Kathy Wilson and her statements, she has actually on more than one occasion tried to help us get Jeru by giving us dog treats. He has walked up to her and her dog on several occasions with no problem. On the day of the incident, she was quite a distance away, unable to see anything and she never corralled her dog. She was standing in the same place when I grabbed him, immediately after walking right up to her and her dog.

I never had a confrontation with her either. She screamed at my son when he was putting out our dog and I simply asked her why. Her statement about who owns what dogs and where the dogs came from is all nonsense. She doesn’t know their names or anything. Jeru has never growled or bared his teeth and, as a matter of fact, when walking by my house, you can barely see the dogs’ faces – unless she is using binoculars, that is.

My mother also never said anything about my husband and children being Spanish. My father actually did and, since the article is causing more harassment to us, I will address this. As soon as we moved in, a neighbor asked us our heritage, which I found to be an odd question but, being proud, answered anyway.

That neighbor proceeded to immediately tell the neighborhood, and one individual in particular began calling the police on my children repeatedly, making derogatory comments and in fact had stopped (due to being threatened with a lawsuit) her nonsense until Terry Eckert started her issue with the dogs. This individual was at the town board meeting but did not speak.

She has also admitted to being a KKK member, so that is why it was brought up.

John Becker states it is a public road, which anyone should be able to walk on. He is correct, yet we are followed and harassed when WE walk on it. Maureen Wafer doesn’t own dogs and has no business in this matter, either. She believes that since she is a town employee for Dewitt, she is above everyone else. She actually is the one who has three grandchildren visit in the summer and also a pit bull that visits that always lunges at people walking by.

The dog control officer does not report to her because she doesn’t have to. The Sheriff’s Office did not call her on Columbus Day: I did when I had to call 911, due to them calling myself and my children filthy names.

The fact is that neither dog control nor the police believed Terry Eckert’s story, and that is why no dangerous dog complaint was made. This dog, which all of the sudden is a menace, didn’t exist until Terry Eckert realized it in August. There has never been a complaint about him in two-and-a-half years because he is very sweet and great with everyone. I had 20 people at the town board meeting to attest to this, but we were not really allowed to talk for some reason.

The whole meeting was very unprofessional.

We were personally invited to be attacked, and it wasn’t the proper venue for Terry Eckert to manipulate the system, either.

Mandy Schmitt, Sullivan