FLATIRON KENNEL CLUB March 2008 Newsletter ...

Many of us received this recent e-mail:

Subject: Illegal entry & taking of dogs!

One of our own is in need of YOUR help as the dog community of Colorado. PLEASE take the time to read below and find out what happened to Bob Attleson’s dogs last Friday when he was at the show. If this is allowed to happen to one, it will happen to more of us. It is my understanding that the City BROKE INTO BOB’S HOME and took the dogs out through windows! If you can pass this on to anyone else in the community that I've left off this mailing, or you know other dog people who can stand up for this wrong, it would be greatly appreciated.
Carole Williams Rainbow Creek Field Spaniels

...

What Carole was referring to by asking the FKC members to read below ... was the request by the All Breed Rescue Network [ABRN], Bonnie Guzman, for a show of support on February 22, 2008, the Court Hearing, which has long past. There were 50 or more people that showed up to support Bob and the courtroom was packed. A Press Release by the City of Littleton's Kelli Nardi went out immediately "Attleson Pleads Guilty." Yes indeed he did. He pled guilty so he could get his dogs returned to him. They were being held as ransom for his guilty plea. Who amongst you would not have done the same thing?

Again, we want to reach out with thanks to all those that have recognized the injustice of this forcible break-in and the illegal seizure of Bob's show dogs.

To those few in the 'fancy' that are working behind the scenes to undermine the good Bob has done in RESCUE, we know who you are. We know what you have done and are doing and we can only pity your ignorance.

United Kennel Club/Hunting Retriever Magazine

Cindy Cooke's article under Dog Owner's Rights:

http://www.ukcdogs.com/WebSite.nsf/Articles/LegislativeUpdate04162008

United Kennel Club: This Means War, by CIndy Cooke

It's been an interesting and positive experience to learn how many of the Fancy in setters and other purebred breeds believe that what has happened to Bob Attleson could happen to any of us.

We need to keep fighting for our passion in dogs and our constitutional rights.

The Makers of our Constitution

"The makers of our Constitution undertook to secure conditions favorable to the pursuit of happiness. They recognized the significance of man's spiritual nature, of his feelings and of his intellect. They knew that only a part of the pain, pleasure and satisfactions of life are to be found in material things. They sought to protect Americans in their beliefs, their thoughts, their emotions and their sensations. They conferred, as against the government, the right to be let alone - the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized men. To protect that right, every unjustifiable intrusion by the government upon the privacy of the individual, whatever the means employed, must be deemed a violation of the Fourth Amendment. And the use, as evidence in a criminal proceeding, of facts ascertained by such intrusion must be deemed a violation of the Fifth........Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding. "

--Justice Louis Brandeis OLMSTEAD v. U.S., 277 U.S. 438 (1928)