Two dogs found dead in trash, 15 more seized
Yonkers, NY (US)

Incident Date: Tuesday, Mar 11, 2008
County: Westchester

Disposition: Alleged

Alleged:
» Peter Byrne
» Anthony Gonzalez

Case Updates: 1 update(s) available

Two dead pit bulls were found in trash bags Wednesday, just as police announced the rescue of 15 other dogs and the discovery of a dogfighting pit in a Yonkers basement.

Yonkers police Commissioner Edward Hartnett said there was some evidence the two discoveries were connected to each other and to two other pit bulls, crippled from dogfights, found in January in a trash bin at a Yonkers gas station. One of those dogs died.

Hartnett said he was unsure there was an organized dogfighting network in Yonkers, but he added, ``a lot of these guys do seem to know each other.''

``It's something going on all over the country,'' the commissioner said. ``There are certain people in our society who find this type of activity entertaining.''

The scarred, dead dogs found Wednesday were in black garbage bags behind the College of Mount St. Vincent, just over the Bronx line from Yonkers.

``We just ripped open a couple of trash bags and found two pit bulls,'' said Ken Ross, police chief for the Westchester County Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. ``One male, one female, decomposed.'' He would not say what led him to the spot.

The discovery of the 15 pit bulls in Yonkers came during a Tuesday night raid by narcotics police, Hartnett said. Besides 6 ounces of cocaine, drug packaging and nearly $16,000 in cash, the police found a 3-foot-high Plexiglas fighting enclosure, treadmills for dogs, weighted neck chains for training, a whip and syringes used for medicating the animals, officials said.

Officers also heard dogs in a garage, obtained a search warrant and called in the SPCA, Ross said. He said the garage was filthy with excrement, no food or water was available to the 15 caged dogs and some were scarred and emaciated.

``The condition of the dogs, the conditions they were living in, it was cruel,'' Ross said. Hartnett said there was ``a significant amount of blood'' on the treadmills.

Hartnett and Ross said both fighting and training were probably conducted in the house.

During the raid, two Yonkers men were arrested on drug possession charges, Hartnett said. Peter Byrne, 25, who lived in the house, and Anthony Gonzalez, 24, were to be arraigned later Wednesday. No attorneys were listed for them on the court schedule.

Byrne's girlfriend and his two sons, aged 2 and 6, were also in the house, Hartnett said.

Ross said the dogs found Tuesday would be examined by veterinarians. The SPCA was determining whether the evidence would support felony dogfighting charges or just misdemeanor cruelty charges. The felony is punishable by up to four years in prison, the misdemeanor by up to one year.

Over the past year, several signs of dogfighting have surfaced in lower Westchester, just north of New York City. Last summer, five Rottweilers and a pit bull were rescued in Mount Vernon, not long after an injured pit bull was found lying in its own blood in the street. Also in Mount Vernon, 63 kittens were found in boxes on the doorstep of an animal shelter, likely saved from use as dogfighting bait. In October, six scarred dogs were found in a Yonkers garage.

Ross said Wednesday that publicity from the dogs found in January and from the case of former Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick, sent to prison for training pit bulls for fighting, had helped raise awareness of the crime. He said narcotics police have been trained to look for signs of dogfighting during their drug investigations ``because the two often are linked.'

Case Updates

References

1010 Wins - March 14, 2008

« NY State Animal Cruelty Map

Not sure what these icons mean? Click here.

Note: Classifications and other fields should not be used to determine what specific charges the suspect is facing or was convicted of - they are for research and statistical purposes only. The case report and subsequent updates outline the specific charges. Charges referenced in the original case report may be modified throughout the course of the investigation or trial, so case updates, when available, should always be considered the most accurate reflection of charges.

For more information regarding classifications and usage of this database, please visit the database notes and disclaimer.