I would like to make the following suggestions in dealing with this fellow
in Spokane.
 
First, when dealing with the prosecutor's office Ms Smith needs to stand up
and assert herself strongly.  In most places police officers are REQUIRED to
act upon a citizen's report of a law being broken.  They may choose to act
in a limited manner but they have to act.  I had a case where someone wrote
me a bad check in the ammount of $50.  When I said I wanted a warrant issued
I was told that they don't prosecute bad checks under $100.  To which I
replied, "Oh, then it isn't illegal to write a bad check under $100???" They
said well, it was, but it just wasn't worth their time to go after the
smaller checks.  Two supervisors later they agreed to issue the warrant but
I was told not to expect them to send anyone out to look for the guy.
Bottom line is that 2 mos later the guy was pulled over for a traffic stop
and the warrant popped up on the computer, the fellow was taken into custody
and I got my money.  You sometimes havc to really push to get them to do
little "unimportant" things but it can be done.
 
Second, if they don't want to prosecute this as an animal cruelty case
(usually a low priority for law enforcement unless they are trying to
generate positive public interest) perhaps you should try a different
approach.  Pursue it as a vandalism (willful damage and/or destruction of
property).  If you consider 80-100 ferrets at $150-$200 each, this ammounts
to a sizeable chunk of money.  And this doesn't even take into account the
medical bills.  You have the added benefit that vandalism will probably
carry a higher penalty than the animal abuse.
 
Just a couple things to consider.
[Posted in FML issue 2146]