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Baby Girl, the pit bull shot by police officers at a park in Staten Island, is recovering as both donations and complaints about the officers’ actions pour in.

The dog remains in a veterinary clinic, where she has undergone two surgeries, the Staten Island Advance reports. 

Special Needs Animal Rescue & Rehabilitation (SNARR), the rescue organization Baby Girl’s owner adopted her from, said the costs of her medical care have already reached $8,000. About $2,500 has been collected through a Facebook campaign to help cover the expenses.

In addition to a bullet wound, Baby Girl suffered a broken toe.

On Saturday, Patricia Ratz and her sister brought their three pit bulls to Schmul Park for a walk. Two of the dogs began fighting. Ratz, in an attempt to break up the fight, stuck her hand between the two dogs and got bitten.

When police arrived, two officers fired their weapons at Baby Girl, even though she hadn’t been involved in the altercation and was running away, Ratz and her sister said.

Police said the incident is under review.

Ratz adopted Baby Girl, who is about two years old, from SNARR six months ago.

SNARR founder Robin Menard is spearheading the effort to raise money for the care of Baby Girl at Garden State Veterinary Specialists in Tinton Falls, N.J.

A website – www.snarrdogpolice.com — has been created to provides updates on Baby Girl’s health and collect donations.

“It’s awesome to see how many regardless of race, beliefs, religion, location and so on, have come together to support the family, my rescue, as well as Baby Girl,” Menard said.

An Iowa woman told police she hung the pit bull she shared with her boyfriend because the dog was old and annoying, and was “going to die soon anyway.”

Sheena Cornwell, a 28-year-old home health aide, hung the 15-year-old pit bull, named Lilly, by her collar and leash from a rafter in the garage, police said.

Cornwell lived in Des Moines with her boyfriend. He told police that she’d been annoyed with Lilly for two months, because the dog paced a lot.

“(Sheena) had complained about the dog before, but she never abused her,” Joshua VanDyke told the Des Moines Register. “She wanted to get rid of her, but she never said anything about doing something violent to her.”

Police reports indicate Lilly was barking in the garage when Cornwell left the room, returning a few minutes later to tell VanDyke, “She’s dead, I killed her.”

Animal control officers removed the dog from the home after police were called. Cornwell was charged with one count of animal torture.

ABC News reported Cornwell could face up to two years in prison and a fine of up to $6,250 if convicted.

(Photo: Des Moines Register)

What police describe as a fight between three dogs left one woman bitten and one dog shot at Staten Island’s newly opened Schmul Park over the weekend.

Police officers say they fired shots after one of the dogs “attacked” her owner, but members of the owner’s family say she was bitten while attempting to break up a fight, and that the dog who was shot –  her pit bull, named Baby Girl — wasn’t even involved in it.

Witnesses said they heard three to five shots, and WABC reported that police officers shot at all three dogs to prevent the situation from escalating.

But they hit only one, Baby Girl, according to Gothamist,

A brother of the dog’s owner said in a Facebook post  that the dog was shot after the incident was already under control, and that  Baby Girl wasn’t involved in the incident:

“The bullet entrance and exit wounds show the dog was running away, NOT [TOWARD] the cop like that coward officer claims. The fight was already under control, yet hero cop of the day felt it necessary to pull out her gun and shoot. THIS DOG WASNT EVEN THE ONE THAT WAS FIGHTING.”

The owner’s brother also claims police left Baby Girl unattended in the back of a truck after she was shot, and told the family they couldn’t find her.

Police say three dogs were involved in the incident, and that at least two of them were fighting. When Baby Girl’s owner tried to break up the fight she was bitten on the hand.

“Responding officers tried to help her, and in the attempt to get the dog off her, shots were fired,” a police spokesman said.

The owner was treated for hand injuries at Richmond University Medical Center.

S.N.A.R.R Animal Rescue Northeast, the group that rescued Baby Girl before she was adopted, supported the brother’s account, saying Baby Girl was running away from the two other fighting dogs when she was shot in the stomach.

A post by the rescue group’s  founder, Robin Menard, indicates all three dogs belonged to the same family.

“Baby Girl was NOT involved (it was two other family dogs) and was running AWAY from the fight when cops fired 3 rounds. Baby Girl was shot in the stomach. She is now fighting for her life and her adopters are paying for a 6000 surgery. They are doing whatever they can. Baby Girl has never had an issue with people or other dogs. She is best friends with a bunny rabbit… Yes. A bunny!

Donations to Baby Girl’s care can be made through the rescue group and its Paypal account (email snarr_1@yahoo.com.)

A proposal to alter dog bite liability law in Maryland looks to be unraveling, the Washington Post reports.

Last month, the House of Delegates passed a bill to address a Maryland Court of Appeals decision declaring pit bulls  “inherently dangerous” and holding their owners — unlike owners of any other dogs — automatically liable if their dog bit someone.

The House passed a bill that didn’t single out any breeds, but shifted the burden of proof in dog-bite cases — proving that a dog was known or should have been known to be dangerous — from the victim to the dog’s owner.

With negotations having taken place beforehand between members of the House and Senate, with its seeming bipartisan support, with it having passed the House unanimously, it appeared smooth sailing was ahead for the bill.

That hasn’t been the case.

The Senate has come up with an amended version of the bill that — while it doesn’t single out pit bulls — makes it “virtually imposible” for a defendant in a dog-bite case to prevail, according to the delegate who negotiated the bill through the House.

Del. Luiz Simmons  (D- Montgomery) says his Senate counterpart had assured him the bill, as approved by the House, would have no problem: “He told me he agreed with the compromise, he told me not to worry about it. We had a deal.”

Sen. Brian E. Frosh (D-Montgomery), who negotiated the bill for the Senate and is chairman of the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee, said that events had taken an unforeseen turn, leaving him in an “awkward position.”

The new provision — it requires owners to provide “clear and convincing” evidence that their dog was not dangerous before an attack — was proposed last week by Sen. Robert A. Zirkin (D-Montgomery) and approved by a majority of Frosh’s committee.

Frosh voted against it, but says he doesn’t think the amendment hurts the bill.

After the bill arrived on the Senate floor Tuesday, there were attempts to delete Zirkin’s provision, but Zirkin fought them:  “I love dogs but if my dog bites a little kid, I should be responsible,” he said.

The feuding could threaten the legislation’s chances of getting passed this session.

Members of the General Assembly failed to pass a similar bill during a special summer session, leaving the appeals court decision that pit bulls are “inherently dangerous” intact.

That court, ruling in a case involving the mauling of a 10-year-old Towson boy mauled by a pit bull in 2007, declared owners of pit bulls (and “third parties,” including landlords) automatically liable in the event that their dog bites or injures someone.

Animal cruelty charges against the head of a dog rescue group operating out of Michael Vick’s former home have been set aside after a key witness failed to appear in court.

Tamira Thayne’s trial in Surry General District Court in Virginia was to have begun Tuesday.

Prosecutors said the misdemeanor charges against the founder and founder and director of Dogs Deserve Better, could be reinstated later, according to the Virginian-Pilot.

Thayne was charged with animal cruelty and inadequate care of animals in August 2012, after an animal control officer and state veterinarian inspected her Good Newz Rehab Center in response to a complaint.

Commonwealth’s Attorney Gerald Poindexter told the court he decided not to prosecute the case because a key witness, a former employee of Dogs Deserve Better who lives in South Carolina, did not show up for the trial.

Thayne, if convicted, faced up to one year in jail and $2,500 in fines.

Chief Animal Control Officer Tracy Terry said charges against Thayne would be refiled “in the very near future.”

Thayne said she was confident that she would have been acquitted.

“I’m an innocent woman and have always been an innocent woman,” she said. “Right now, I’m free, but there’s still this little bit of weight on my shoulders…. It’s not totally gone.”

Thayne opened the Good Newz Rehab Center in June 2011 at the rural estate on Moonlight Road where Vick once ran a dogfighting business.

Vick served 18 months in federal prison after pleading guilty in 2007 to charges related to a dogfighting operation.

The Maryland House of Delegates yesterday approved a bill that would make it easier to hold all dog owners accountable for injuries caused by their pets — not just those who own pit bulls.

The Washington Post reports that the measure provides “a small measure of victory to pit bull owners,” whose dogs had been singled out by a Maryland court last spring as “inherently dangerous.”

The bill effectively overturns the Maryland Court of Appeals decision, Tracey v. Solesky, which stemmed from a 2007 incident in which a pit bull mauled a 10-year-old Towson boy.

The measure approved by the house Thursday would make it easier to hold all dog owners liable for injuries caused by their pets. In the past, plaintiffs suing the owners of dogs had to prove the dog was dangerous. Now it will be up to dog owners in liability cases to prove in court that their dog is not dangerous.

The 2012 court decision made owners of pit bulls, and their landlords, automatically liable in the event that their dog bit or injured someone.

Animal rights groups protested the appeals court decision, saying it was leading to dogs being euthanized and tenants being forced to surrender their dogs or move. The House bill does not contain breed-specific language.

Mark Buehrle, the Miami Marlins pitcher traded to the Toronto Blue Jays last November, will be leaving his dogs and family behind when the season opens, due to Ontario’s ban on pit bulls.

One of the Buehrle family’s four dogs, Slater, falls under the government’s pit bull ban, so Buehrle’s wife Jamie, their children and their dogs will remain in Florida until the end of the school year, then return to their off-season home in the St. Louis area.

The Toronto Star reports it will be the first time in his career that Buehrle has spent the summer away from his wife and children.

It’s not the first time, though, that the family has been inconvenienced because of their love for pit bulls in general, and Slater in particular.

When Buehrle was traded to the Marlins, from the White Sox, his family couldn’t live in the Miami-Dade area, because of a similar ban, and located in Broward County instead.

“Other families have gone through things and they’ve made it work. And I will see my dogs when I can,” Buehrle said of the Toronto situation during spring training last week.”

Spiked collars, break sticks and Michael Vick’s indictment papers are among items on display at a new exhibit at the Crime Museum in downtown D.C.

The dogfighting exhibit, put together by the ASPCA, is scheduled to run through September.

“We want the public to see that dogs used in dogfighting are the victims of the crime, not instruments of the crime,” said Dr. Randall Lockwood, senior vice president of ASPCA Forensic Sciences and Anti-Cruelty Projects. “We want people to realize the brutality of dog fighting and see that it’s the greatest violation of the human-animal bond.”

Janine Vaccarello, chief operating officer at the Crime Museum, told WTOP the exhibit seeks to expose the public to the brutality of dogfighting, but that attempts were made to keep it rated “PG.”

The exhibit features artifacts and evidence seized by the ASPCA during dog fighting raids, including the largest dogfighting raid in U.S. history, carried out in 2009.

The exhibit, “Dog Fighting: The Voiceless Victims,” also looks at the work of ASPCA veterinary forensic experts in investigating such crimes.

Among the artifacts in the exhibit is the indictment naming Michael Vick, the NFL quarterback who served time for his participation in dogfighting and has since worked to speak out against it and rehabilitate his image.

“Personally, I have difficulty in forgiving him, but if he can be helpful in the fight against dog fighting, we welcome whatever help we can get,” Lockwood said.

Also on display are a treadmill used to condition dogs for fighting; a “rape” stand used to immobilize female dogs for breeding purposes; breaking sticks used to force a dog’s release on another dog; a spring pole used to strengthen a dog’s bite, neck, and leg muscles as he pulls or hangs from the end, a handmade nailed collar used to antagonize fighting dogs; an electrocution device used to kill dogs who lost a fight or failed to show sufficient aggression; and a pit bull skull excavated from a dogfighting crime scene.

Lockwood says pit bulls have suffered most from dog fighting.

“Too often, pit bulls in general are demonized as the weapons of dog fighting, but from our perspective they are the victims of dog fighting,” he said.

The exhibit does have some upbeat notes, including the story of Dragon, a dog rescued from a Virginia dogfighting ring who has since been adopted into a new home.

(Photo: ASPCA)

Officials in Pennsylvania believe they have found the source of that pit bull corpse that turned up in Chester County — a dogfighting operation they say operated out of a home in West Brandywine.

Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan announced the arrests of a husband and wife Wednesday.

He described their home as “a house of pain and horror for the dogs that lived there. The defendants’ dogs lived by one rule: Fight and win, or die.”

Hogan said five young children also lived in the home, one of whom was  bitten by one of the dogs. In retaliation, that animal was hung with a coaxial cable, he said.

The Unionville Times reports that, according to the criminal complaint, the father, who referred to the animals as “livestock,” acknowledged killing at least 10 dogs by hanging or electrocution, and said the couple was “planning on making the training and fighting of pit bull dogs a family business.”

Shane Santiago and Laura Acampora, both 33, are accused of operating a dog-fighting business that led to the deaths of at least 10 dogs and the maiming of countless more.

Six living dogs were recovered from the home and are in the custody of the SPCA, according to the York Daily Record

The investigation began after two abandoned pit bulls were found — one, who had been burned, dead in cage; another maimed and burned but still alive, alongside a road. That second dog, Radar, is recovering under the care of the Chester County SPCA.

The younger of the pit bulls was found on the same road the Santiago’s lived on, just miles away.

Santiago was first identified as a suspect when he was arrested on drug charges as part of Operation Silent Night, an operation aimed at curbing violent crime in Coatesville. Neighbors had complained about large numbers of people visiting the property, many from out of state and most bringing dogs with them.

Investigators observed the couple from afar, and went through their trash. They finally managed to search the property after the landlord, who was evicting the Santiagos, gave permission.

“When we got into that home, what we found was a nightmare,” Hogan said. “This was a full-scale operation of not only dog fighting, but dog training, dog breeding and dog killing.”

They discovered a treadmill, tools used to encourage aggression, and an arena in the basement, with blood-spattered plywood barriers set up around the fighting area. Up to 16 pit bulls were kept in the home at one time, Hogan said.

Santiago and Acampora are charged with more than 30 counts of animal cruelty, endangering the welfare of a child, and conspiracy to commit animal cruelty. Both were being held in Chester County Prison.

(Photos: Unionville Times)

To hear Fox 2 in St. Louis tell it, a massive round up of pit bulls was underway last week in the small town of Sikeston, Missouri.

According to the Fox report (above), animal control officers were seizing pit bulls from homes around town — so many that the Sikeston shelter had to send 20 dogs to St. Louis to make room for all the pit bulls they were rounding up.

Other TV news operations, and the Standard Democrat in Sikeston, were quick to report that the Fox News account was a little off the mark.

Sikeston, which does have pit bull restrictions, picked up three dogs it said were not in compliance with the rules — but no roundup took place.

Wednesday’s Fox News report by Chris Hayes that Sikeston held a “pit bull round up day” led to dozens of calls to the newspaper, and a flurry of online alerts and notifications.

Hayes reported that he “found out about the program after learning about a sudden influx of dogs coming to the St. Louis area” and that it was “to make room for seized pit bulls.”

Sikeston City Manager Doug Friend said allegations that the city held a “pit bull round up day” weren’t true.

There are 32 pit bulls registered in Sikeston, according to Friend, and the city audits those on an annual basis.

“It’s not a big process,” he said. “We just basically drive by, verify that somebody that had a registered pit bull still lives at a registered address. Our plan was to just do our annual look.”

During that recent audit, three pit bulls were taken into custody for non-compliance with the city code. It requires that the owners of pit bulls and some other breeds register those pets with the city, carry liability insurance, and keep their dogs in a fully enclosed pen if they are outside.

KFVS also reported that the Fox report was misleading.

According to KFVS, about 30 dogs were shipped from the Sikeston shelter to no-kill shelters across the country, including one near St. Louis.

Friend told KFVS that the transfers, the seizures, and the TV report added up to fear quickly spreading among pit bull advocates, in Sikeston and around the country.

“To suggest and sensationalize the way that the news reporter did is … I’m at a loss for words” Friend said. “I mean, we’re a rural town of 18,000. We try to serve the public to the best of our ability. Everything we do is tailored to the health and safety of our citizens after extensive public comment.”

Of course, none of that is to suggest pit bull bans and restrictions make sense. They don’t.

But for a news organization to suggest, based on a couple of unconnected facts, that a round-up of all pit bulls is underway is a similar sort of fear-mongering — and one that’s neither fair nor balanced.