I did some digging and found out the animal control officer listed on the intake paper in the photos on that website may have been involved as a defendant in a Civil Rights Case - place is right, name is right. You always have to think about harrassment of blacks down here. People get stopped all the time for "DWB".

http://dockets.justia.com/docket/court-scdce/case_no-4:2007cv03559/case_id-153872/

I grew up in the south and saw a lot. I still remember sitting in a courtroom where 4 white frat boys who were drunk and driving their cars in circles around a police officer in a parking lot got a "boys will be boys" lecture and "not to do this again" and walked out scott free. The next case was an old black man who had a suspended license - DWI --- but he was sober and his ride had not showed up to take him to work and he was scared of losing his job so he drove to work, sober, and got caught. "What the hell we going to do with you 'boy'?" Yes, I am not kidding. This was 1981 in Athens, GA.

Ok, according to this actual news article, he *did* give the dog to the shelter

(FYI the Senator was a plaintiff in the referenced case, BTW, but does not seem related)

http://www.wistv.com/Global/story.asp?S=8116855

Without knowing some of the time frames here, it's difficult to tell what's really going on.

Two ways to look at it:

1) If the senator found the dog and turned it into the shelter, that's a "surrender" and a good deed in my books. He should be commended for that.

2) If the senator owned the dog for some time and is now surrendering it while it's pregnant to a shelter, that's a "dump" and the senator a slime ball should be ashamed of himself.


More information is needed to be able to tell the difference here.

In the WIS-TV article, he did use the possessive, "my", when refering to the dog.

I'm voting #2.

In the WIS-TV article, he states "My German Shepherd was given to the local shelter for her own safety, with the knowledge that I would reclaim her if no one else did. Any suggestion to the contrary is a complete and utter falsehood."

For her own safety??? What on God's green earth is he talking about??? His whole statement is incredulous. Let me check my driver's license.....hmmmmm....nope, I wasn't born yesterday.

Although I drafted my email last night, I was waiting before I sent it to this slimeball, waiting to see if indeed it was his dog. Now that I know it was, he's going to get my email.

Yeah, his "spin" just put him into the slime ball category.

Typical unethical political mouthpiece!

What a jackass.

Will, I think this definitely places him in the #2 category. I checked Florence News and found an article for today:

http://www.morningnewsonline.com/midatlantic/scp/news.apx.-content-articles-FMN-2008-04-04-0008.html#reactionQuestion

I made a few "inquiries" (locally), but have not heard any feedback yet. I am guessing that since if apparently has hit news and seems to be hot topic in the Florence County area, some prefer not to comment.

With all due respect, being a minority leader in a rural, predominately minority location, this leader gives me the impression that he considers himself a "cut above the rest" and obviously from the above article believes himself above reproach.

Yep, #2.

Yeah, definitely #2!

Something is wrong here though... According the the link posted by Tony, "State Sen. Kent Williams, Marion County’s deputy administrator, said he was only trying to help when he adopted three animals from the Marion County Animal Shelter late last year."

How could he have adopted an intact dog? He's either lying about having adopted those dogs, or the Marion County Animal Shelter did very wrong in adopting an intact dog.

"Williams said he did not have the dog spayed because he hoped to breed her." WTF?!?!?!

Alex, like many other places position has its privileges/advantages. This area is primarily a farming type community with a lot of poor people. Although it may be hard to understand how things like this happen in this day and age, some of the "rural" (or, backwoods) areas around here can really seem rather primitive sometimes. I really am at a disadvantage at being able to adequately describe how people in some of these areas live without sounding too prejudicial and/or like a bigot. I am not at all surprised by what is reported. I am confident that if the senator showed up at the shelter for a dog and wanted it without being altered, it could/would be done without hesitation. He could make it even easier by just picking up the phone and calling the shelter, requesting someone drop the dog off at his house. This is a right to work state and quite literally, I believe, if the senator was denied such a request he could easily pick up the phone and jeopardize that person's employment. Quite frankly, he is a minority and very few people are going to rebuke him for fear of being labled as some kind of racist.

Guess what you haven't seen and what may not exist at all. The form/application he should have had to fill out when adopting a dog in the first place.

Something wrong, yeah, I'd say so. Things like this have become common to the point of being acceptable by some.

But that does not make it right!!