Many states, including Iowa, criminalize the intentional killing, injuring, maiming, torturing or mutilating of dogs (just ask Michael Vick). However, Iowa, along with many other states, provides an exception to that rule, making it lawful for a person to kill a dog caught “worrying, chasing, maiming, or killing any domestic animal or fowl.” The rationale behind the law is to protect domesticated livestock, and it is a complete defense if a person shoots a dog while in the act of harming domesticated livestock.
In this case, the defendant shot two dogs that were caught “worrying” the defendant’s fenced-in white-tail deer in January 2006. The trial court jury convicted defendant of two counts of animal abuse and one count of criminal mischief in the fifth degree- all simple misdemeanors. The defendant sought an acquittal on the basis that the deer were being “worried” by the dogs which ran along the perimeter of the fence, frightening the deer and causing them to run into fences and injure themselves. After he shot the dogs, the defendant found his prized fawn dead, supposedly because of the dogs. The trial court judge refused to acquit the defendant, noting that his conduct was “unreasonable” under the circumstances.
On appeal, the court reversed the defendant’s convictions on all counts. The court noted that the dog-kill statute did not contain a “reasonableness” requirement. Thus, the reasonableness of the defendant’s killing of the dogs was immaterial. The only issue that mattered was whether the dogs were shot in the act of doing one of the statutorily enumerated acts to domesticated livestock.
Interestingly, the court did not have to address the issue of whether white tail deer are “domesticated animals” under the statute, because both parties stipulated that they were under the facts of the case. The defendant raised the deer for sale to petting zoos and game preserves and for breeding purposes.
On another note, the case may have come out differently had the shooting occurred after July 2007. During the 2007 legislative session, an amendment was made to the dog-kill statute (Iowa Code §351.27) to delete the term “worrying” from the justifications for dog killing. It is obvious in this case that the worrying of the deer was the defendant’s primary justification for shooting the neighbor’s dogs. State v. West, No. 7-481/06-1316, 2007 Iowa App. LEXIS 1052 (Iowa Ct. App., Oct. 12, 2007).