The Chronicle Herald (Provincial)
Dog breeder takes stand in own defence
A Kings County woman facing three charges under the Animal Protection Act testified in her own defence Thursday, saying she was doing everything she could to comply with orders from the SPCA that they wouldn't explain to her.
Karin Robertson, 58, is charged with failing to comply with an order and causing animals to be in distress at her border collie and Jack Russell terrier breeding operation near Wolfville.
She told her trial in Kentville provincial court that she had been breeding dogs since 2011, and was inspected by the SPCA on a regular basis with no issues of concern ever being raised with her. In 2018, she built a new outbuilding to house some of the animals, and the SPCA reported no issues after a May 2019 visit to the site.
At that point she had 62 dogs, she said, and still had no concerns expressed to her.
Trouble started in July 2019, she said, when she was slandered on a Facebook page by someone claiming that she sold sick border collie puppies. That part of her business suffered as the post was widely shared, and the border collie numbers increased with no one buying them. She ended up with a total of 82 dogs of both species at one point, and she was trying to decrease the number of dogs.
In September of that year the SPCA showed up on an unrelated issue, she said, and started looking at her operation again. She told them she was trying to reduce the number of dogs, and testified that she was doing everything she could. By December the number was at 35.
She said that in September 2019 and on subsequent visits she was told she had to comply with the Canadian Kennel Club's code of practice, which she was unaware of and had not been provided with before that month.
“At the end of each visit they gave me orders (to comply), but didn't go over them with me,” she said.
The orders included to have things she already had in place, she said, and sometimes referenced a section of the code of practice that didn't match the order.
“I asked for clarification on several occasions,” she told her lawyer, Brian Casey. When asked what their response was, she replied “that I should read the code, they weren't going to explain it to me.”
She said that in late November she received an email from the SPCA telling her she had to depopulate or the dogs would be seized.
“I asked how many dogs I could have and they told me to read the code, but it only talked about space.”
She said based on that, she calculated that she could have 40 dogs, but told the SPCA that if it was too many she would give them the surplus.
She also said that she felt she had complied with all the orders given to her over the previous months.
“I was shocked and traumatized when I went home that day (of the seizure) and there were no dogs left.”
She denied testimony from the SPCA that dogs didn't have bedding in crates, saying that the reason that some crates didn't have bedding was because she was laundering them when the SPCA arrived.
She said she mopped the kennels and floors daily, and always had dogs watered and fed, but that she couldn't fill a bowl as soon as it was empty if she wasn't right there.
She also testified to a video she recorded the day before the seizure that showed the dogs running and playing in
the snow, in contrast to videos the SPCA had recorded showing some pacing back and forth along the fence line, or acting frantic.
The dogs had never acted that way, or been withdrawn or fearful, except for the days that the SPCA was there shooting video, she said.
Robertson said under crossexamination by Crown attorney Jim Fyfe that the SPCA never told her they had concerns about the dogs possibly being in distress, and nothing was said about it in any of her orders to comply.
She said SPCA video from the day of the seizure that showed a lot of dog feces on the ground in outdoor runs was likely because it was hidden under the snow that had been on the ground until the rain and warm temperatures that day had exposed it. She denied simply covering it with shavings.
She admitted that there was dirt on the walls of the kennels and she wasn't cleaning them as often as she wanted because she was trying to reduce the number of dogs she had while trying to comply with the multitude of orders the SPCA had imposed on her.
“The orders to comply were my priority,” she said.
She said that was also why the dogs weren't groomed recently, as that was not something mentioned to her or put in an order.
The trial continues in the new year.