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Ohio Senator Bill Beagle
Beagle
Introduces “The Klonda Richey Act”
COLUMBUS— State Senator Bill Beagle (R–Tipp City) announced legislation
today aimed at reforming Ohio’s laws pertaining to nuisance, dangerous,
and vicious dogs. Following several tragic incidents in the Dayton
region and across the state, Beagle along with several other local
lawmakers decided to address the issues within existing Ohio law.
“The Klonda Richey Act” is named after a Dayton woman who was
tragically mauled to death by two dogs. After making over a dozen calls
to local officials over several months regarding her neighbor’s dogs
threatening manner and the lack of care they were receiving, the
mixed-mastiffs attacked Richey in her front yard on an early morning in
February 2014.
“The system has failed Klonda Richey, and many others in our
community,” said Senator Beagle. “We all agree there are ways to
improve the code and hold owners of dangerous dogs more accountable by
including penalties for offenders and tools for local officials who
deal with problem pet owners.”
The legislation was drafted after months of collaboration with the City
of Dayton, county officials, local prosecutors, dog wardens, sheriffs,
humane officers and others. The group met multiple times over the
course of the last year to work on creating a better system to protect
innocent Ohioans from vicious or dangerous dogs.
Under current law, some authorities have said the penalties do not
match the offense, describing this as “one free growl, one free bite,
and one free kill". To fix this, the legislation strives to give local
authorities the tools they need to address problem dogs and their
owners without punishing those that are not a serious threat to the
community.
“The Klonda Richey Act” will do this by including a number of
substantial changes to state law. Changes include creating a more
comprehensive penalty structure for nuisance, dangerous, and vicious
dogs as well as clearer penalties for seriously injuring or killing a
person or a companion animal. It will extend the amount of time felons
cannot own dogs from 3 years to 5 years and add child abusers to the
list of restricted owners. Additionally, every call to a dog warden
will generate an investigation or follow-up and will allow those seeing
the crime to sign affidavits as witnesses. It will also create
penalties for not complying with the requirements of owning,
transferring or registering a dangerous or vicious dog.
“Making these changes is just the beginning of what we need to do to
reform a broken and ineffective system,” said Senator Beagle. “We need
to make sure our local officials have what they need to prevent such
tragedies from happening in our communities.”
The bill will be referred to a Senate committee to undergo hearings.
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