Sunday, December 30, 2007
Editorial: The realities of animal fighting
Animal fights are cruel and bloody. They also often involve gambling, drugs and organized crime.
From the RoundTable blog
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Credit Michael Vick for one thing, if nothing else: His high-profile arrest and guilty plea highlighted the sordid, cruel world of dogfighting.
State Sen. Roscoe Reynolds, D-Henry County, wants to ride the resulting wave of revulsion to pass a bill making dogfighting a qualifying offense under Virginia's Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act.
Though Vick was thoroughly punished for his criminal behavior, Reynolds' bill makes sense, and could help state prosecutors make a case against dogfighters with a lower profile.
As Kathy Strouse, legislative liaison for the Virginia Animal Control Association, said, "Dogfighting is never just about two dogs fighting. It's always about other things, including gambling, money laundering, drug offenses, firearms offenses, assaults, even murders."
Dogfighting, unlike other types of animal fighting, is already a felony in Virginia.
But, as Reynolds said, his bill would provide "another tool for state prosecutors, commonwealth's attorneys, to have to use when dealing with the problem associated with organized dogfighting. It parallels federal statutes and would give commonwealth's attorneys and sheriff's departments power they don't have under state law."
The Vick case could help Reynolds get his bill passed, unlike legislation he sponsored last session to make other types of animal fighting a felony.
But Reynolds shouldn't give up on his past crusade. Cockfighting is every bit as cruel and corrupting as dogfighting.
For instance, a September federal indictment charged a man who ran a cockfighting establishment with offering a bribe to a Page County official to ignore the operation.
Virginia has some of the weakest cockfighting laws in the nation, which encourages out-of-state participants.
These are not the kinds of tourists Virginia wants to attract. At a bust earlier this year in Mecklenberg County, three-quarters of those involved were from out of state. Police seized cocaine, marijuana and $40,000 in cash.
Animal fighting -- of all kinds -- deserves to be included in Virginia's RICO statute.
