With new anti-animal and anti-child abuse law, Ohio moves up in animal protection rankings - cleveland.com
COLUMBUS, Ohio – The Animal Legal Defense Fund ranked Ohio 24th in the U.S. in animal protection laws in a new report, up from 30th the prior year, after the General Assembly passed a law recognizing the link between animal abuse and domestic violence.
The report accompanying the rankings stated that Ohio and Florida enacted laws last year requiring social service workers and veterinarians to report suspected animal cruelty. The social workers and vets will receive criminal and civil immunity when reporting in good faith.
“We’re thrilled to see more states taking the important step of not just allowing, but mandating that these stakeholders report animal abuse and neglect, for the sake of the animal victims,” said Lora Dunn, the Animal Legal Defense Fund’s criminal justice program director, in the report.
Ohio House Bill 33 went into effect April 12 last year. In addition to new requirements for vets and social workers, animal control officers must immediately report child abuse to children’s services agencies or police officers.
Furthermore, police and animal control officers must report abuse of a companion animals to a social services professional when they suspect it may impact a child or older adult in the home.
The legislature passed the law to help break the link between animal cruelty and domestic violence, child abuse and elder abuse. Research shows some people control and abuse animals in an attempt to control, abuse or financially exploit intimate partners, children and older adults, said Vicki Deisner, executive director of Ohio Animal Advocates.
Republican Reps. Laura Lanese of the Columbus area and Sara Carruthers of the Cincinnati area sponsored the bill.
Lanese, who has championed a number of animal welfare bills, first introduced the legislation in 2017. It passed the House, but the two-year legislative session ended before the Senate passed it. In 2019, she introduced it again and it passed at the end of 2020.
Lanese said that in advocating for the bill, she learned that some domestic violence victims don’t seek refuge at family shelters, not wanting to leave their pets behind, “because they know what’s going to happen to them.”
Veterinarians face a high suicide rate in the U.S. Many vets come across cases of suspected abuse and the new law is a tool in their arsenal, Lanese said.
“The primary goal is to stop the escalation of violence,” she said. “We know in a lot of cases, not all their cases, people get their ‘courage’ – in fact, that is a term a police officer used with me – people get their courage with their violence starting with smaller pets. And sometimes you see it with other animals. But they get their courage in the home, and it escalates from there.
Our goal is if we can stop violence at the lowest level we would not only be able to save those pets but also save the people in the homes, as well as the community at large. We know that school shooters, serial killers, Jeffrey Dahmer types, got their courage from animal abuse,” Lanese said.
Deisner of Ohio Animal Advocates said Ohio continues to make strides in animal welfare laws. In 2015, the state created pet protective orders for victims to have animals removed from homes.
In 2016, the legislature made bestiality illegal and made animal cruelty a felony. One of the first people charged with a felony was a Warren man who was sentenced for skinning a pit bull and posting video of it online.
Slowly the state is making progress, Deisner said.
“When I moved back here from D.C. in 2012, we were 45th,” she said. “But there have been a lot of laws that we’ve passed. This law (connecting domestic violence and animal violence) makes a big difference because it’s so comprehensive.”
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source: https://www.cleveland.com/news/2022/02/with-new-anti-animal-and-anti-child-abuse-law-ohio-moves-up-in-animal-protection-rankings.html
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