Durham Herald-Sun

DA backs animal cruelty charges

By BETH VELLIQUETTE, The Herald-Sun
June 3, 2005 7:42 pm

HILLSBOROUGH -- District Attorney Jim Woodall has reviewed the evidence gathered in the case of 66 dogs that were seized from a home in northern Orange County, and he supports bringing animal cruelty charges against the couple that kept the animals.

Animal Control officers are compiling the charges against the couple, but it could be Monday before they complete their work and file the charges against Robbin and Kenneth Wiseman, who kept the dogs in their home on Old Noble Road in northern Orange County, Ron Holdway, interim director of Orange County Animal Control, said Friday.

Animal Control officials showed evidence of the condition of the dogs to Woodall Friday morning at his office, Holdway said. The number and types of charges will depend on the condition of each individual dog, Holdway said.

A veterinarian examined the dogs -- most of whom were greyhounds -- after they were seized, and investigators have been waiting on some laboratory tests to finish their work, Holdway said.

Six of the dogs have been euthanized, but the rest have been farmed out to rescue groups or foster homes.

The Wisemans apparently believed they were rescuing the greyhounds, Holdway said.

But the amount of food and water needed daily for 66 dogs and the effort it would take to feed and care for them would be nearly an impossible task for two people, he added.

"I just can't fathom in my little brain how you manage that, and obviously they were not managing that very well or at all," Holdway said. "I don't know how you would even try to attempt to do that with two people."

It appeared some of the dogs had not been out of their crates for extended periods of time because they were covered in feces, Holdway said.

In 2000, Robbin Wiseman told The Chapel Hill Herald about a greyhound named Harry that she had rescued from a medical laboratory in Minnesota. Harry had been a racing dog that ended up being sold illegally to a laboratory that used greyhounds to test heart pacemakers. Once the testing was done, the dogs were killed, Wiseman said at the time.

She wanted Harry and went to great lengths to rescue him because Harry was the grandson of a greyhound she already owned, she said.

Robbin Wiseman told the Herald that in 1995, she saw an advertisement about greyhounds available for adoption through a greyhound rescue program. She adopted one of the dogs and then another and then began working with a greyhound rescue program, she said.

In 1998, she began her own rescue program for older greyhounds and greyhounds that had special health needs.

"Older dogs can be harder to place," she said at the time. "I take dogs that other people won't take, and they've just been a joy."

In 2000, Robbin Wiseman said she had placed 30 greyhounds in homes.

Last week, when Animal Control officers went to Wiseman's home, they saw the couple had a large fenced area for the dogs to run, but no outside kennels or dog houses, Holdway said. It appeared Robbin Wiseman and her husband kept all the dogs inside their home, some of them in dog crates, Holdway said.

Each of the dogs had names, and the Wisemans told the animal control officers the names of each dog as the officers seized them, Holdway said.

Animal Control officers were unable to find any record that the Wisemans ever applied for a kennel license, Holdway said.