Meth Blamed For New Animal Control Hazards

Benton, IL -- Jarrett Broy, Franklin County Animal Control supervising officer, is used to dealing with vicious dogs.

Lately, he has been finding himself facing a new and potentially more dangerous problems -- vicious owners.

It has changed the way Broy approaches his job, from scheduling officers to adoption policies and right down to the way he goes up to the front door of a house with a problem animal.

He blames the methamphetamine epidemic. And he now carries a gun, as authorized by the Franklin County Board.

"What you run into now is that meth is so widespread, (the meth users) get these dogs with the macho image -- the pit bulls and the rottweilers."

Broy said the breeds themselves are not at fault. Though they may be chosen for guard duty because of certain characteristics, he said it's the owners who make the dogs mean. Broy said he has enough experience, and enough repeat encounters with the same problem people, that he can often anticipate a problem even before he leaves the office. Still, as he sizes up the situation before getting out of his truck, he looks for signs of trouble that he would never have dreamed of years ago.

"I'll look before I get out for the surveillance cameras," he said, noting that such security equipment often accompanies established drug houses. "When they come to the door, they'll have a gun right here in their waistband, and they don't care if I can see it. That's when you know something is wrong."

He said another warning sign is when he is greeted by the dog owner before he can even get all the way out of his vehicle and step foot on the property.

He told about one incident where the offending dog's owner came out to the road to talk to him rather than allowing him to approach.

"He went straight up to the road, and that kind of bothered me," Broy said. "He had on a pair of cut-off jeans, no shirt, no shoes. I could just tell he was wild. I was talking to him about the dog, telling him I didn't want to have to pick up his dog and that he'd have to make sure it was secure. He stuck his finger right in my face and said, 'If you pick up my ... dog, I'll blow off your ... head.' And he turned around to walk away and he had a gun in his back waistband."

Broy said when he is able to get to the front door, he'll sometimes find that there is more than one problem dog on the property. He'll find them tied to each entry.

Other times, he'll try to explain the problem to an owner who is holding the dog by a short leash or by its collar, and the whole time the dog is lunging at him.

"It's getting to the point you don't know what you're walking up on," Broy said. "Last year I got a call to a place where there was a rottweiler. There's a guy across the street with a rifle pointed at the guy with the dog, who has a pistol. And I'm in the middle of it."

Another time Broy was called to a remote rural area where two pit bull type puppies had been dropped. He found them in the vicinity of meth waste. Word got out that the small holding facility had two pit bull puppies, and the office was flooded with requests for them -- some requests coming from people who had presented problems for animal control in the past.

"We sent them to a rescue," Broy said. "We'll have people come in with their teeth rotted out from meth asking if we have any pit bulls. We're seeing a lot more pit bulls. I don't know where they are getting them all."

Broy said he has been asked to accompany Department of Children and Family Services employees to homes with vicious dogs. And he has had to call the sheriff's department for backup to deal with unruly owners.

"I've been knocking at the front door, and all of a sudden the dog is coming out the back door," he said. "Someone let him out, and they aren't coming to the door."

Broy said he has had owners in suspect locations act as if they are complying with his request to take a dog. He'll find two dogs in a room where he was told there was only one, or the dog will not be in a confined area as he was told.

"They do that because they want me to get bit," he said. "It's not an everyday thing, but you just never know."

Broy said he has had some cases where he strongly suspects the dog itself may have been given meth. He has seen situations where dogs have been built up with steroids, and other circumstances where he suspects dog fighting may occur.

In some Southern Illinois counties, the sheriff's department handles vicious animal complaints. Some other counties are authorizing animal control officers to carry guns for their own protection.

The Franklin County Board has recently authorized Broy to carry a gun on his calls. He doesn't even want to discuss it, he said, because the very notion seems to give people the wrong idea.

Broy said he already makes sure to have a back up officer if he suspects there will be a problem, and he calls for a deputy if one is available.

However, there have been times when he has been called in after hours or to an unknown location and no deputy is immediately available to help. Those are the times when securing a dog may be his job, but it may also be only one of his worries.