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It might have been one of the quickest mistrials in Lancaster County history.
Leacock Township kennel owner Daniel P. Esh's trial for alleged state dog-law violations already had been delayed a day because of a host of pretrial motions flying back and forth. On Thursday, when it finally got under way, testimony from the commonwealth's first witness, state dog warden Kristen Donmoyer, led to Judge Howard F. Knisely granting a mistrial at the request of Esh's attorney, Jeffrey Conrad.
Esh faces up to a year in prison and a $2,500 fine for each of three misdemeanor counts of violating state dog laws at his operation, Scarlet-Maple Farm Kennel, 68 Clearview Road, Ronks.
Assistant District Attorney Christine L. Wilson said she agreed with Knisely's decision to declare a mistrial and will pursue charges again in court, possibly as early as Monday.
In her testimony, Donmoyer said she saw Esh "frantically trying to clean" the inside of his kennel, which has nearly 500 dogs, when she visited Nov. 2 for an unannounced inspection.
"There was an extreme amount of feces under the wire pens," Donmoyer testified. "It became evident that's the way it was throughout the kennel and that it had not been cleaned for a couple of days."
State dog laws require kennel operators to clean feces and urine from kennels daily.
Donmoyer said she filed charges against Esh based on what she saw at the kennel, "as well as Mr. Esh's admission of guilt that it had been more than one day" since he had cleaned the kennels.
Knisely ruled for the mistrial, Wilson said, because Donmoyer's use of the word "guilt" could potentially taint the jury's perception of Esh's actions. But Wilson also raised an objection — to Conrad's opening statement, in which he said that Gov. Ed Rendell had directed the Bureau of Dog Law Enforcement to hire a SWAT team of inspectors, including Donmoyer, with only one purpose: "to shut (Esh) down."Wilson said she objected to Conrad raising the possibility of Esh losing his state license to operate his commercial dog-breeding kennel as a result of the trial's outcome. Attorneys are not allowed to reference to jurors possible penalties if a defendant is convicted.
"The charges filed have nothing to do with whether he loses his license," Wilson said.
Given Wilson's and Conrad's opening statements — and the lengthy resolution of pretrial motions — what was supposed to be a one-day trial over three misdemeanor charges appeared to be turning into quite a courtroom brawl.
On Thursday, Wilson came out swinging, saying Esh was charged for leaving breeder dogs' kennels full of feces and their food receptacles contaminated with mold, feces and hair.
"(Esh) runs a puppy mill — a large-scale breeding operation for the purpose of profit," she told jurors. "The defendant grossly fell down on the job. The defendant failed to maintain his kennel in a humane way."
Conrad, addressing the jurors as "folks," played up the recent controversy surrounding Lancaster County's large-scale dog-breeding industry and portrayed the charges against Esh as little more than a witch hunt.
"Is (Esh's kennel) a puppy mill? Well, that certainly is what the whole world is up to say these days," said Conrad, a former assistant district attorney who worked alongside Wilson until he left the DA's office last year for private practice.
"The commonwealth wants to make this man a criminal," Conrad said. "But it's not industrial waste. It's not nuclear waste. It's not toxic waste. These are 'turds.' Lets just get the word out there."
(452) (415) (403) (381) (142) (118) (97) (94) (62) (55) (44) (39) (37) (29) (26) (6) (5) (2) (2) (2) (2)Conrad said dogs commonly put feces in their own feeders. He said Esh's young children would testify that they were charged with cleaning out the feces while their parents were at a wedding, but that a clog had caused the feces to back up in the kennels two days before Donmoyer's unannounced inspection. "If someone popped into your house right now, what would they see?" Conrad asked jurors.
In his opening statement, however, Conrad said that Esh cleans out his kennels only six days of the week. And Esh faces higher-level misdemeanor penalties this time because he already pleaded guilty to three lower-level summary violations less than a year ago. Penalties are bumped up for repeat offenses when defendants are charged with additional violations within 12 months.
E-mail: slindt@lnpnews.com
