Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
TOOELE — The owner of an animal clinic in Tooele is getting a lot of grief for euthanizing a pet dog that was brought to him. But he doesn't apologize for it. He says the dog was incredibly sick and in pain. Others say putting the dog down wasn't his call to make.
A 20-year-old Pomeranian mix was brought to Joe Roundy's Tooele clinic by animal control Tuesday with no collar.
"It's entire body was covered with scales and scabs," Roundy said.
Roundy wasn't there, so his staff made the decision to euthanize the dog, Adia, with a myriad of visible health problems.
"This animal is suffering," Roundy said. "This is not a matter of us covering up anything. We admit, we made that decision."
It happened less than two hours after Adia went outside for her morning walk around 9 a.m. Her owners, still too upset to go on camera, say by the time they called animal control and got to Roundy's clinic at 11, it was too late. It set off a firestorm on social media that Roundy's staff had acted too quickly.
#poll
Marci Wicks with Tooele Animal Outreach showed the documents which detail Roundy's service agreement with the Tooele County Sheriff's Office. The papers state that he is to board animals for a minimum of three days before they are put down. The mandated time period is in the process of being extended from three to five days.
"It is five days, according to law, it just hasn't been revised on county documents, which they are fully aware of," Wicks said.
Roundy showed his paperwork as well from animal control which states that the dog was abandoned and injured. He says he was putting the dog out of it's misery.
"I don't even know if it would have lived five days," Roundy said. "Somebody's got to make a decision on an animal with no identification that's got severe injuries or suffering. What are we going to do?"
