Justice and Mercy

Justice: the administering of deserved punishment or reward.

Mercy: compassionate or kindly forbearance shown toward an offender, an enemy, or other person in one's power; compassion, pity, or benevolence

I have another blog that I have been working on. The one I promised on Monday about our vacation. Our internet was in an out all day yesterday. It was never in enough to finish the blog. So I will do it tomorrow.

Today we went to court for our dog, Ranger, so I thought I'd update you on that really quick.

Court was difficult for me. I would like to see both justice and mercy in this case. How to do that is a balance. Today was about the dog owner - I'll call her D - pleading guilty or not guilty. I guess it was never really clear whether we needed to be there or not but we went anyway and I think it was fine that we did.

We were to be there at 8:30 when they started going through cases but the ADA did not talk to us until probably 10 or so. The ADA was an old youth kid - totally a God thing. We were able to talk to him as a lawyer and a friend. It was really nice.

I shared with him that we'd like to see our vet bills paid (although at this time we aren't sure exactly what the total cost will be) and the dogs dealt with to make sure that they aren't able to harm the Blegers or anyone else for that matter. Most likely that means they will be destroyed which is sad to me but I do understand that it may be necessary. He went and met with D and then came back and said that she's plead guilty and would like to take care of our bills. She is not ready to put the dogs down - which I can understand.

We met with D and she was very emotional and remorseful (at least it seemed that way to me). I felt bad for her. We lost one dog and it was horrible. I can't imagine how it would feel to be responsible for that and then to know that it is very possible to lose both of her dogs. Yes, she was irresponsible in the owning, guarding and containing of her dogs - and I do want to see justice for that - but I do not see a need to pursue anything further with them. D deserves mercy just like anyone else. I don't like what happened but nothing else I can do will bring back our dog or reverse this whole horrible ordeal.

So as it stands now we will need to meet with a mediator and D to see if there is another solution other than destroying the dogs. At this point I'm not sure what that will be. Maybe there's something we haven't thought of but truthfully I don't know how she can guarantee that her dogs will never do this again. She didn't think they would do it this first time. But we will meet with them and see if there is another way. Then we meet with the judge on July 30th {my birthday -- happy birthday to me :) } to present our arguments then the judge will decide what will happen to the dogs.

I told D that since both sides were so emotionally involved in this that I would trust the judge to make a fair decision. We can both present our sides and then respect the judges decision. Although I sure hope that if the dogs aren't destroyed that they are moved far away from the Blegers. I can't imagine living in fear of going outside your home or letting your kids play outside. Those 2 dogs caused enough injuries to kill our 80# dog. I can't even begin to think what they could do to a child. And that is what concerns me the most and what I want justice for.

So that's where we stand. I'd rather just be done with it. The animal shelter called me today to say that Ranger's ashes and his collar were ready to be picked up. I asked Mark to go. I do not like going there for any reason really. My sisters joke with me that I'm an animal hater and I joke with them that I'm not an animal hater but a child lover - meaning I don't have the time or the emotional energy with 3 littles to give a pet tons of attention. Ranger and Obi (our cat) are definitely family members and I love them but my kids have to be my top priority so it may sound that I don't really dig animals. But truthfully I love animals and don't like to see any hurt or die. Going to the shelter has always been hard for me - even before kids - because I hated to see animals abandoned and desperate for a home. I knew I couldn't help them so it just made me cry. Now to go and have to pick up my dogs ashes was more than I could handle. Poor Mark has to do it.

Well that's the story here as it stands. I will update more when we have our mediation and then our next court appearance. And I will hopefully have more happy and funny stories from our vacation for you tomorrow!