The Nova Scotia SPCA is crossing a line by asking the public to attend Monday’s hearing, where an owner will appeal the seizure of its 35 dogs, a Halifax lawyer says.
On Dec. 10, SPCA officials seized dogs and puppies from a site near Wolfville after an investigation that was launched in September in the wake of a visitor to the site having reported animal mistreatment.
Since then, the owner has appealed the seizure under the Animal Protection Act of Nova Scotia.
“Anyone can attend! With your support, we can fight for justice,” the Nova Scotia SPCA said in a tweet, which also listed the date and time of the hearing, that it posted Dec. 26.
The owner of the puppy mill has appealed the seizure of the dogs under the Animal Protection Act of NS. The appeal board is holding a public hearing at 9:30 on December 30 at The Future Inns 30 Fairfax Drive, Halifax. Anyone can attend! With your support, we can fight for justice pic.twitter.com/nucTtjIts8
— Nova Scotia SPCA (@NSSPCA) December 26, 2019
David Fraser, a lawyer at Halifax-based McInnes Cooper, said the SPCA should be held to the same standard as the police.
“Obviously when you have an organization called the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, they have a particular job to do that’s inherent in their title in the same way that you could probably call police an organization for the prevention of crime,” Fraser said in an interview Sunday.
“We do have to expect, or we should be able to expect, that they’ll carry out their function in a fair and reasonable and even-handed function.”
Fraser said if a police officer encouraged members of the public to attend a specific person’s court case, it would be seen as “extremely problematic.”
“It’s one thing for the police to take part in public education programs for drinking and driving, for example, but it would be entirely inappropriate if they were to charge somebody with drunken driving and dangerous driving causing death and then organize a rally in front of the courthouse to try to essentially intimidate the judge,” he said.
"You can see rallies as signs of public support, but you can also see them as trying to intimidate the tribunal and so I think in this particular case they just go way over the line."
JoAnne Landsburg, chief provincial inspector for the Nova Scotia SPCA, declined to be interviewed Sunday but said in an emailed statement “the SPCA is not asking for people to rally and attend the hearing.”
“We simply put out a release that anyone is welcome to attend,” Landsburg said.
But Brenda Gerrior, creator of the Justice for Meeka Facebook group, told Todd Veinotte of News 95.7 “the SPCA actually put out on their Nova Scotia website that they would like for people to come, support, rally against (and) listen to what these people have to say on Monday morning.”
Gerrior has invited all 1,300 members of her Facebook group, and anyone else who's interested, to rally outside the hearing.
Landsburg said “the SPCA appreciates animal advocacy yet recognizes that an appeal hearing is part of a fair and due process under the law.”
Fraser said if the SPCA is unable to separate public education and advocacy efforts while exercising out of a law enforcement function, their role in the justice system needs to be re-evaluated.
“We don’t have many other organizations that are kind of private organizations that are given law enforcement functions,” Fraser said.
“Maybe they’re not the appropriate people that should be doing this if they’re not going to take their job as part of the administration of justice seriously, and hand it back to the police or the Department of Agriculture or somebody else, because as soon as they call for a public rally like this they’re unsuited for their function.”
The appeal hearing, separate from the criminal charges, is to be held at the Future Inns at 30 Fairfax Dr. in Halifax at 9:30 a.m. on Monday.
