Men Sentenced For Torture Death Of Dalmatian

Three men were sent to prison Friday for tying up a Dalmatian, taping its mouth shut, sicking a pit bull on it and slitting its throat and belly.

“Gratuitous cruelty is awful. It creates disgust in the community,” Bucks County Common Pleas Judge Edward Biester said.

Jan Pyatt was sentenced to six months to 23 months; Roy Elliott to nine months to 23 months; and Jason Tapper to 1 1/2 to three years.

Not everyone thought Biester went far enough.

Violet Aharonian was one of several hundred animal rights activists at the courthouse. She held a sign calling for a death sentence.

“They took life, and their life should also be taken,” she said.

In January, a jury found all three men guilty of mutilating and killing the 7-year-old dog named Duke.

Prosecutors said the men, all in their early 20s, tied Duke to a tree, taped his mouth shut and let a pit bull attack him. Two of the men cut off the dog’s ears and tail, slit its throat and sliced open its belly. The men claimed the dog attacked them and one of them hit Duke with a concrete block in self-defense.

The men’s lawyers did not object to the sentences. Deputy District Attorney William Moore was pleased.

“It sends a message to people that if you are cruel to animals you are not going to get away with it,” he said.

Mary Callahan, who had owned Duke, called the sentences “fair and just.” She gave the dog to the three in July because she was moving to an apartment that didn’t allow pets.

“I’m not happy, because it still doesn’t change what happened to Duke,” she said.