Couple Gets 7 Years After Dogs Fatally Maul Child

GRAHAM, Texas (AP) – A couple whose pit bulls fatally mauled their 7-year-old neighbor were sentenced to seven years in prison, the first conviction under a new state law that holds owners responsible if their dogs injure or kill someone.

Crystal Michelle Watson, 28, and Jack Wayne Smith, 45, were convicted Thursday of a dog attack resulting in a death, a second-degree felony with a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. The law says owners are guilty if their unsecured dogs injure or kill a person in an unprovoked attack off their property.

“I compared it to someone leaving a gun out in front of children,” Stephens County District Attorney Stephen Bristow told The Associated Press, recalling what he told jurors during the emotional trial last week.

After the sentencing Friday, state District Judge Stephen Crawford said each defendant would be eligible for release on $150,000 bond pending appeal, which is allowed for certain crimes with sentences less than 10 years. Watson and Smith had not posted bail and remained in custody Tuesday.

Attorneys for the couple who live just outside Breckenridge did not immediately return calls to the AP seeking comment Tuesday.

Witnesses testified that on May 18, Tanner Joshua Monk walked toward Smith’s and Watson’s house to play with some children, Bristow said. That afternoon his body was found in a ditch surrounded by four pit bulls, about 100 yards from his home and about 70 yards from the defendants’ property, authorities have said.

Deputies called to the scene had to kill two dogs that tried to attack them. Witnesses testified that when authorities went to pick up the other two, Smith turned over one but reluctantly handed over the other, saying it was an indoor dog although Tanner’s blood was still on its coat, Bristow said.

The state statute enacted last year is called Lillian’s Law after Lillian Stiles, 76, who was killed by a pack of

Rottweiler-pit bull dogs as she tended to flowers in her Thorndale yard on Thanksgiving weekend in 2005.

After the death, her daughter Marilyn Stiles Shoemaker of Austin founded TxFADD, Texas Families Against Dangerous Dogs, to bolster awareness of dog attacks and pursue legislation aimed at placing criminal responsibility on owners whose dogs instigate unprovoked attacks.

Shoemaker and her father, Jack Stiles, then lobbied the Texas Legislature.

State Rep. Dan Gattis, R-Georgetown, one of the bill’s sponsors, said the law does not target a specific breed, the Temple Daily Telegram reported in Tuesday editions.

“The fact is that these attacks are happening all across ourstate, and many times the victims are children and the elderly,” Gattis said. “What is especially infuriating is that these tragedies could have been prevented had the irresponsible owners secured their dogs.”

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)