Dog owner accused in horrific animal abuse case repeatedly fails to show up in court

Content warning: This story details graphic examples of alleged animal cruelty that some readers may find disturbing. 

On a scorching sidewalk in Niagara Falls last July, Dakota collapsed, bloodied and gasping for breath.

A muzzle was cinched tight around the German shepherd’s mouth, a plastic bag stuck inside, obstructing her airway.

She died before help could arrive. 

The trauma to her body from a long run through the city in overpowering July heat, her leash and the metal bars of a table she’d been tied to clanging on the pavement behind her, was just too much. 

Earlier this year, Dakota’s owner Carly Young was charged with four offences under the Provincial Animal Welfare Services Act (PAWS) for permitting distress to an animal, “exposure to undue risk of distress”; and not providing basic standards of care. The charges have not been proven in court.

Dakota, captured on cellphone video last July, runs down the street in Niagara Falls, dragging the metal bars of a table behind her.

(Facebook)

The charges were the result of a loud public outcry spurred by videos of Dakota scampering through the streets spreading widely on social media.

“It wasn’t until we were screaming and making these posts that they did anything,” Donna Power, co-founder of the animal advocacy organization, the Humane Initiative, told The Pointer at the time.

Young has refused to show up for any of her scheduled court dates. 

On July 22, after two consecutive no-shows, a 2-hour trial date for September was set and a bench summons was issued to force Young to attend and answer to the charges. A bench summons gives police the power to arrest the individual to ensure they show up in court. 

The Pointer previously detailed Dakota’s tragic story, through interviews with witnesses the day of Dakota’s death, neighbours of her owners, and animal welfare advocates.

Animal Welfare Services (AWS) had been called multiple times about the living conditions Dakota was subjected to.

The police and AWS were well aware of the alleged mistreatment of Dakota by her owners through multiple complaints from residents who lived in the same building. 

For months, advocates were left questioning why no action was taken. 

Following her death, calls for action and “Justice for Dakota” quickly emerged, along with demands for the police or provincial animal welfare officials to hold Dakota’s owner accountable for the suffering she endured that day. Commenters demanded to know how this happened.

As the story spread online, Young, who began sparring with critics through Facebook posts and comments, denied any wrongdoing.  

Neither Carly nor her husband Chris Young replied to requests for comment from The Pointer. 

In several posts written in the days following the incident, both Carly and someone writing on her behalf claim what happened that July day was a terrible accident. 

“I was sitting at the table with her; she didn’t like loud noises. The cable guy moved his ladder, and it made a loud noise and spoked (sic) her and she bolted,” a post from Carly stated. “I was sitting with her, and I went after her, and she is very fast.”

She claimed both her and her husband were looking for Dakota. As for the plastic bag in her mouth, “she picked it up on her way to where she was running.”

Someone writing on Carly’s behalf threatened legal action against those demanding accountability for Dakota’s death. 

“Listen to all these nasty messages. People are sending Carly has all been documented and is all with my lawyers,” a post from Carly’s account reads. “All these messages will be investigated. I know Carly is a very good dog owner and dog lover…please don’t come to Carly and say we are unfit dog owners. We love our pets unconditionally.”

Carly was meant to make her first appearance at the Welland courthouse on February 25th. She was a no-show. The matter was pushed to July 22, where Carly failed to show up again. 

Power with the Humane Initiative says this is the reason why the police and Crown Attorneys need to consider criminal charges of animal cruelty instead of the provincial offences, which she says carry little weight. 

“There needs to be an appropriate consequence for committing this. Right now, the message is very clear…you can do pretty much anything to animals and face little to no true justice,” Power says. “There is no deterrent. Under the Provincial Offences Act…there is no criminal record for a conviction, and a conviction is meaningless outside the province of Ontario.”

Rarely do even the most awful acts of animal cruelty result in Criminal Code charges, even provincial offences are a rarity. 

According to the limited data provided by AWS for 2023, of the 2,893 cases where the abuse was so egregious the animal had to be removed from the owner’s care, only 10 percent of those (296) resulted in charges being laid. Of the nearly 40,000 calls received at the Ontario Animal Protection Call Centre, 57 percent of them are closed without any inspection, follow-up, or investigation being completed. 

“I look at our justice system with perhaps naive eyes, assuming that people doing illegal actions will face legal consequences. I don’t believe that anymore,” Power says. “I believe that our justice system is so overwhelmed and that there are crimes that are just being ignored. The fact that, on the books, animal cruelty is a Criminal Code offence, but is not charged as a criminal offence; that the crime is adjudicated in traffic court, overseen by a Justice of the Peace and prosecuted by law school students shows very clearly the actual importance animals are given on the ladder of what matters. The words coming from our elected provincial leaders do not align with their actions. They may say animals matter, but they are still simply a piece of private property.”

As previously detailed by The Pointer, the PC government has taken little interest in putting forward real solutions to addressing the significant gaps in Ontario’s animal welfare system. The government’s legislation to end puppy mills has few mechanisms to actually accomplish that goal; the failure to create a license system for breeders is allowing the proliferation of online puppy sales that further harm animals; and the ongoing unwillingness to adequately resource the AWS department. 

Ontario, a province with a population of 15.8 million people, has fewer animal welfare inspectors than Manitoba, which has a population of 1.5 million.

The trial in Dakota’s death is scheduled for September 18 at 1:30 p.m. in a Welland courtroom. 

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