Richard Rosenthal’s approach diverges from progressive animal law. Litigating animals as property may seem at odds with the ideal of fighting for their rights or personhood, but it is often the most efficient way to save the life of a dog.
HOPE CORRIGAN: The case before the court involved a Rhode Island greyhound named Lexus, accused of killing a Pomeranian in a dog park. The prosecution was asking for the death penalty, and a lawyer for the defense, Richard Rosenthal, was there to stop it…
As an animal attorney for more than a decade, Mr. Rosenthal takes on custody cases, sues veterinary clinics for malpractice and has made a specialty of defending dangerous dogs. In doing so, he often enrages local officials, animal control officers and district attorneys. But even animal rights groups have expressed frustration with him… “I’m a hired gun,” Mr. Rosenthal said, acknowledging his reputation as the go-to lawyer to get dogs off death row. “If I take a case, it’s about winning. I take it because I believe in it.”
Lexus the greyhound’s case was a turning point for Mr. Rosenthal. After that, he and his wife, Robin Mittasch, founded the Lexus Project in 2009, a nonprofit that provides legal representation for dogs ordered to be euthanized. It turned out there was a market for his services… Cases began flooding in from around the country. One in particular inspired Mr. Rosenthal to abandon his 30-year family and criminal law practice to go into animal law full time.
It is not remotely a feel-good story. The case involved an enormous dog in Nevada named Onion, a 120-pound mastiff-Rhodesian ridgeback mix. Onion killed his owner’s 1-year-old grandson after the child stumbled and startled the sleeping dog… Eventually, the county dropped the case rather than force the grieving family to appear in court, and Onion was sent to a rescue sanctuary in Colorado…
In such cases, Mr. Rosenthal employs the same dispassionate legal argument every time. He allows that it is a tragedy when a dog injures or kills another dog or, worse, a person; but he says all circumstances must be considered before the dog is euthanized. It’s a position that doesn’t always play well with the public. “With Onion, we got hate mail,” he said. “We got death threats”…
Thompson Page, an animal attorney in Connecticut, regularly serves as co-counsel with Mr. Rosenthal (who is licensed to practice only in New York and several federal districts). He and Mr. Rosenthal founded the Center for Animal Litigation, a nonprofit network of lawyers that, like the Animal Legal Defense Fund, works pro bono on animal cases around the country. “It’s David versus Goliath every day,” Mr. Page said. “We are civil rights lawyers for four-legged creatures”…
Both Mr. Rosenthal and Mr. Page expressed distrust of law enforcement. “All of a sudden it came to a point where, invariably, when a cop shoots a dog, their first description of the dog, no matter what the dog is, is that it was a pit bull,” Mr. Rosenthal said… animal control officers, who are often considered part of law enforcement, have a considerable influence on what happens when a dog bite is reported. They are often primary defense witnesses when a kill order has been enacted for a dog. “We want animal control officers to actually have training in dog behavior so they understand why and when dogs fight,” Mr. Page said…
The history of animal law in the United States can be reasonably traced to a landmark 1972 case brought by a constitutional lawyer named Henry Holzer, who sought to end kosher slaughter, a practice that he argued did not render livestock unconscious before killing them… In 1979, a network of animal lawyers created the Animal Legal Defense Fund, which focuses on both litigation and advocacy. The A.L.D.F. currently has over 2,600 pro bono attorney members. Today, animal law is expanding rapidly. More than 160 law schools in the United States offer at least one animal law class…
But there are obstacles to being a dog lawyer. Courts generally do not grant animals habeas corpus, or the right to a trial — a significant barrier to litigating animal law. Recently, a high-profile case surrounding Happy, an elephant at the Bronx Zoo, brought the issue of personhood into public view and tested the boundaries of applying human rights to animals.
Advocates at the Nonhuman Rights Project, the organization representing Happy, argued that the elephant recognizes her reflection in a mirror, indicating she has self-awareness and consciousness and should be released from captivity to an elephant sanctuary. The New York Court of Appeals rejected the argument, ruling 5 to 2 that Happy is not a person, at least not in the legal sense.
This is where progressive animal law theories and Mr. Rosenthal’s approach diverge. He is quick to draw a distinction between successful litigation and advocacy that relies on animal law to change court definitions of personhood, an effort that he deems an “intellectual pursuit.”
“I am an oddity in animal law in the sense that the holy grail of the animal law is to have animals declared something other than just property,” he said. “What I argue and litigate are strict property concepts.” Litigating animals as property may seem at odds with the ideal of fighting for their rights, but it is often the most efficient way to save the life of a dog.
Unlike the years-long case pushing for the personhood and release of Happy, Mr. Rosenthal’s approach to animal law feels urgent. He said he doesn’t have time to try to convince the court of an animal’s personhood. “The difference is, in my cases, there is a dog or cat that’s going to die if I don’t win,” he said. “So to me, I need to win the case”. SOURCE…
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