• The Cat's StorySupportThe SentenceWhen blood's in the water; it is best to be the SharkWith the bunnies, in the meadow (To Live Outside the Law, You Must Be Honest)"
• Packing
• Animal Law in Wisconsin
• Vindication But Not Justice
• To Dance beneath the Diamond Sky with one hand waving FreeClick here to restore the background to this page
• WANT TO TALK ABOUT THIS? COMMENTS ARE HERE

• Man Who Went to Dog's Defense Now Faces Felony Charges  
• Bambi's Fate
• Deer Woman pays harsh price for her defense of animals
• Janesville woman cited for excess of cats
• Greenconsciousness Comments Here
• See also Jeannine's comments at the bottom of this page in the "your comments" section.
• DNR attacks Wildlife Rehab Center's Patients

I have yet to be sentenced on three criminal counts of violating an injunction, have yet to be tried on resisting arrest, have yet to be tried on bail jumping (don't ask -it is pure bullshit). And either Helen or the police or the DA sent every filled-with-lies police report to the Board of Professional Responsibility in the hope they would take my license to practice law away or at least hassle me enough to give up the license.

I never had any money. I got the law license to help children and animals. It is not a calling which makes people rich or even comfortable. The only way I can pay these fines and pay the criminal defense lawyers I had to hire, is to sell my house. I have virtually abandoned my practice as the persecution became more and more intense.The chief's favorite thing has been to arrest me on Ken Dombeck's word that I was harassing him; hold me in a jail cell all day and then drag me through the courthouse chained at the waist and ankles, in handcuffs. Then, afterward, I would have to walk home in the rain. The last time our regular judge, who refused to be involved in this and reclused himself, ordered them to drive me home.The substitute judge, Lineweber of Richland Center and the substitute DA Andrew Sharp, also from Richland Center, appointed by our DA Eric Peterson, who came here from Richland Center and got elected with lies about the former DA, make up this little fraternity of witch burners. They want to show me who is boss.This "judge" who granted Helen Dombeck, cat killer, an injunction based on nothing but her testimony, that I threw rocks at her and threatened to shoot her dogs, which really no one but Lineweber would have believed, said... if the innocent Dombecks are bothered by one more cat in their yard, the Court will impound all the cats (and presumably kill them thereby finishing the Dombeck's killing spree for them).Lineweber wants to kill these cats for the Dombecks and then tell me it is my fault he had to do it. Judge Lineweber of Richland Center, with his horse farm and his airplane, who worships property and pretends to believe everything the liar-killers and their liar-defenders tell him. Because he shares their values.Small towns-small minds-tiny, tiny, brains-and they elect them again and again.Anyway most of the time, I just stay in this house with the six cats and prepare to sell the house I was remodeling and that I loved. But I want to garden outside and have my cats with me more than I love this house. I want to be free in nature and there is no chance of that with the killers next door and this small town corruption that protects them. This story is horrible and I will tell it sometime but not today.I do not live in an urban setting. I live in a town of 4,000 people-deliberately. I live here precisely because I want to be able to let my cats go outside. My animals all lived to be 15 to 20 years old before the Dombecks, who I believe have been killing neighborhood animals for years, turned their attention to me. I lived here six years and never saw a dead cat in my street until I forced the cops and the legal system to prosecute the Dombecks.
I have had all the arguments possible with the people who feel cats should be caged up in the house and I am sick of talking about it with that mentality. They never say outdoor enclosures and cat fences are too expensive and they do not have that much money to spend on cats. No, they say they keep their cats indoors for the cat's safety.The D A prosecuting me proudly said his cat has never been out of the house. These are the people who do not need nature in their lives and they cannot understand. They will never understand.

Their cats are used like property for their owner's amusement and comfort. They never consider what the cats want or need (mental stimulation, exercise and green plants to use as medicine). And their idea of keeping the animals safe is a cage. And the joke is that most of them are rarely at home. They work all day, do their errands and feel free to go out two-three nights a week and to "seminars" on weekends. They don't stick around long enough to feel the despair and grief of their animals.

These are the same people who tell women to dress modestly and not to go out at night if they don't want to get raped. They have the "blame the victim" mentality and it is impossible to penetrate their self-righteousness to get them to think about eliminating the abusers.

Wouldn't you know these are the kind of people who go to church every Sunday and want to be soldiers in the war on people...I mean war on drugs. As long as it is the poor and dispossessed they can throw in the mud and handcuff. Someone I thought was a friend told me if I didn't want to say "under god" in the pledge of allegiance I should just stand silent while everyone else said it.
I guess she never really heard the part about one nation, indivisible. Small town - all Christian-all the time.If the dullness and the slowness of a small town has no rewards, why suffer it? Most of my depression and helplessness lifted with the decision to leave this town so I have been successful at dieting to get the cat killer pounds off. And my taste is back to normal.It is what they call Easter today, although the actual Spring Equinox has come and gone.
Easter closed the town down-hell they closed the village hall on "good" friday. These are the same people who do not have Holiday Parties at winter solstice-they have CHRISTmass parties. The local bar has CHRISTmass parties, for christ's sake, as if they never met a non-christan lawyer.No supplies in the house and the cats wanted treats so I went to a gas station for food. I bought a bag of tortilla chips and a Cousin's vegetarian sub. The young boy making it was one of those sweet small town boys who have to work at places like the submarine part of the gas station and take the smirks and BS of their classmates. You know his classmates, the small town teenage bullies who drive up and down Main street at night squealing their tires and booming the low tones on their radios in the cars mommy buys them.This pleasant, polite, helpful boy was so sweet, helping me find some cat treats and sincerely wishing me a great easter. But the food!The vegetables were not fresh but from cans and the can taste was the only taste in the whole soggy mess. And the chips were deadly-they are the kind that are supposed to be just corn tortillas but they too had a stale chemical can taste.None of this stopped me from eating every last thing and now I am sick with nausea and disgust.

Happy Easter America. Agri-business fills your head with lies and your bodies with poison just like the Dombecks did to my cats. Because the Dombecks and the agri-business folks have the same values.

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Support

I received an email today:

"Please understand that I am not blaming you for the violence perpetrated upon your cats.
But if, as you have said that you did suspect your neighbors were killing your cats, 
then to allow them to go outside in whatever form leads me to believe that you may have taken some better precautions. This is not to "BLAME THE VICTIM" as you call it, because frankly, you are not the victim. Your dead cats are the victims."

This is my answer to a reasonable criticism.

Did you actually read my whole story as I asked? 

If you had, you would see that I have cat fence-in now (under the heading "to dance beneath the diamond sky"). I write about it both on that page and on my blog. I have done more to publicize the Cat Fence-In system since 2002 than the manufacturer. Why? Because when I was suffering no one knew how I could protect the cats outside.

In that entry I explain why I feel it is the right of cats to be outside as well as inside. Here I want you to know why I let them outside with the Dombecks next door.

Yes there is a kernel of truth in what you say but god is in the details. The kittens were shot 9/11/2000 and then it was winter. In March/early April of 2001, I built the fence and let them go outside. Understand, I watched them from the door every 15 minutes but sometimes became distracted or forgot and it was longer before I checked. 

But the frequent checking is how I caught the Dombecks luring them into their yard. The problem was that the police ALWAYS chose to believe the Dombecks.

I also, as always, allowed the ferals (and we are talking about ferals and strays I tried to help) stay in my yard and I fed them. We did not have a shelter until that year. When they were tame enough, I caught them and took them to the vet to be neutered and vaccinated. Then I let them live in the house or yard as they chose. Feral Luna, her babies and 2 strays lived in the house but Wanda and Valentino did not want to come inside although eventually they would have come inside.

Where I was wrong is that I only stopped letting the house cats (those I had tamed) out in July of 2001. I kept believing, for 4 months, that the fence would protect them - that it wasn't really happening but it was. 

But if you read my story carefully you would read that I caught the Dombecks opening the gates, I caught them luring the cats under the fence, I believe they shot them out of the trees in my yard and I believe Ken Dombeck opened the screen door while I was at a hearing and took Dreamer. 

I called the police and reported the screen door was open when I got home and a cat was gone but the Police Chief Calhoun said the cat must have opened the door. It was locked - my patio door locks and I locked it before I left. I told him that and he said I must have forgot. After all those dead cats I did not forget to lock the patio door.. 

You, just like other people, do NOT yet understand animal abusers. It will never end until you STOP BLAMING THEIR VICTIMS and focus on stopping abuser behavior. With attitudes such as yours, rape victims would still be blamed for their own rape because they went out at night alone, dressed provocatively and all the rest. 

Many animal lovers are stuck on this blaming the victim owners which is why I want to lead a movement to focus on the abusers. Until that shift in consciousness occurs we will be chasing our own tails until we drop over dead on top of our dead animals. No matter what an animal guardian does wrong, no human has a right to harm the animal. If they did not get pleasure from hurting animals they would work with the owner as I begged Ken Dombeck to do with me. 

People who do not want animals in their yards can build fences with the Cat fence-in system, they can let the owner come in their yard to take the cats out and use a squirt gun (not a pressure hose as Ken Dombeck did to a 5 month old kitten in front of me who was forbidden to cross the property line). 

Ally Cat Allies has two pages of things property owners can do to keep cats out of their yard and garden. When the kittens were born and Ken threatened me, I gave him these pages of devices and asked him to work with me to train the kittens but instead, he snuck around under cover and shot them like the big game hunter he pretends to be. 

Then, when the fence went up, he worked to lure them into his yard to prove he did not kill them in my yard. And the brain dead legal system is his biggest defender as property rights is their primary value. Ken and Helen really knew how to use the system. Almost as if they had a lot of practice somewhere else.

You are wrong to say I am not the victim. After those four months, when they couldn't get at the cats, they came after me. Dombeck tried to run me down with his car in front of my house but the chief had me arrested and dragged through the courthouse in chains and shackles after being kept in the drunk tank all day. This complaint has still not gone to trial

Then when I would not leave my house, Dombeck called in a harassment complaint saying I yelled across the fence that I was going to kill his dogs. They got away with that lie to get the restraining order so why not use it again. The cops came to my front door saying they were going to arrest me on a lie again. I said no you are not and slammed the door. They kicked it down, charged in and as I was asking for a search or arrest warrant, they began beating me up. One of them beat me into semi-consciousness. I woke up in the jail, in a straight jacket chair. They charged me with battery to a cop and resisting arrest.

I am still fighting them in court and I will never stop until this story wakes up the animal rights movement. In Wisconsin, all the laws that are enforced are those to protect hunting and hunters. Animal lovers and supporters have no rights and we are persecuted. Most cops are hunters and that is where their sympathies lie. 

I will write a book someday and give all these details and I will lead a movement to stop these predators. You are wrong not to understand me but I understand why you do not. And I accept the blame that is due me. It is the blame that is due to a person with too much trust in goodness and the system. 

Some people are evil. And the system exists to protect property not life. The legal system exists to serve as a career ladder for politicians who follow the majority sentiments of their class and their kind. The system needs radical reform, by any means necessary. The legal system has never respected my rights. The boys laughed while they degraded, humiliated and beat an uppity woman. I can only hope with all the rest of the unjustly persecuted that it is we who inherit the earth.

Ken and Helen had a domestic disorderly charge before they began attacking me.  I always believed Ken and Helen had a sick relationship that demanded an external target to abuse in order to maintain their sick relationship or their diseased characters would turn on each other.  They usually bonded around killing animals (as hunters and fishers) but they had a second honeymoon around persecuting me.  You think this is crazy talk as did the DA? READ THE BOOK the sociopath next door  by martha stout, ph.d.

A blog that has the right attitude toward the blame the victim animal rights groups is Cat Out Loud.

cat out loud
http://catoutloud.blogspot.com 

Blogs You Should Read:
Feral Cat News

See also: 
the Ally Cat Allies, Trap Neuter and Release program at http://www.alleycat.org 
also endorsed by the Madison Humane Society http://www.humanesociety.dane.wi.us 
and Milwaukee Humane Society http://wihumane.org/endcruelty/wildcats.html 

To really understand what is going on with the Cat Tribe people and the TNR movement, you can read a wonderful book that you will finish in two or three exciting days. 

Shadow Cats: Tales From New York City's Animal Underground by Janet Jensen.

Just send ten dollars along with your return address and a note stating whether you want the author to sign the book to the following address.

Shadow Cats 
504 Grand St. Suite A-62
New York, NY 10002 - 4182

Alliance for Animals offers spay/neuter discount vouchers!
(06/18/2002)
To help curb pet overpopulation in Dane County, Alliance for Animals is offering Spay/Neuter discount vouchers from participating veterinarians. If you need financial assistance with a spay/neuter operation, call us at: 608-254-6333. Also, help us spread the word by teaching others about pet overpopulation and how to make positive changes.

Also See the Doris Day Animal League for more spay/neuter help, but first contact your local Humane Society. I believe in Wisconsin, the Dane, Rock and Milwaukee County Humane Society offer some economic assistance, especially for people on farms with large cat populations. Probably other counties also do offer some assistance.

State by State Low Cost Neutering

It is cruel to neuter Tom cats with rubber bands and other self-help devices. I understand that well meaning people do not mean to be cruel when they do this. They have been told it doesn't hurt the cats as if cats have no feelings in their genitals. But think people, it does hurt the cats - long slow painful agony. You should not do self help methods. People who tell you it does not hurt them, hate cats.

The Sentence

Well Helen Dombeck was there, smirking and smiling in her red jacket. Kenneth was not there and never has been there. They are careful to keep him out of sight and off the witness stand. Ken rarely wears clothes other than his camoflague pants, t-shirt and dark glasses. Sometimes he adds a spiffy camouflage jacket to his ensemble and completes it with a floppy olive green hat with floppy brim. I am presuming this is a hunting hat. Actually there are a fair amount of men who dress like this in rural Wisconsin and he is one of them.

But Helen glories in appearing respectable and sympathetic. Only I get to see her true colors because I know and she knows that she lies. Maybe she doesn't know. All I can be certain of is that she knows I never threw rocks at her and I never threatened to kill her dogs which are the lies she used to get the harassment injunction. There were no reports to the police of these incidents because these incidents were fabricated after Helen discovered that the police knew her husband was shooting my cats.

Helen denied (very convincingly, even I was impressed) her husband killed my cats at the injunction hearing and she tried to deny his conviction at my trial (the trial for going in her yard to get the cats). But her attorney (or excuse me, the state's attorney) forced her to admit it and she finally did after about four insistent questions.

So I was found guilty of the first charges against me, those 3 counts of violating a restraining order. Two counts were for cats in Dombecks yard, one count was for me going into their yard to bring out cats who were trespassing. The other charges, (including the attempt to run me over with his car, the alleged insults over the fence, and battery to cop) will be heard Feb 21, 2005. 

For the 3 counts of violating the restraining order, the Judge sentenced me to three years probation, an unbelievable length of sentence for cats running in someone's yard twice and me going in to get them once;

Also sentenced me to 60 hours community service;

The Richland County DA asked for a psychiatric evaluation and that I be committed to a in-patient mental hospital. The Judge said, her probation agent can order a psy eval.

The court also sentenced me to Pay Helen Dombeck $300.00 for pictures of the cats in her yard that she took and developed for trial. Remember, they could not manage to get me the $50.00 dollars restitution ordered for my dead kitten from the Dombecks or even return the pictures of my dead cat, but if I do not pay Helen you better believe they will put me in jail.

Though aware that I stopped taking new clients, the Judge ordered me to pay the costs of this action. This is how they really hurt you. They have taken my livehood; but if I do not pay those costs, the Judge will put me in jail. Then they charge you interest while you're in jail working on the Huber law at McDonald's.

Radicalizing, isn't it? Do you understand now why people join the ALF? No justice-Just Us.

The Judge ordered me not to have contact with the Dombecks, like I ever wanted contact with those creeps- and to obey the injunction not to enter or allow the cats to enter his yard. The cats have not been out of the house since July 2001. I have gone outside only to go to the supermarket and to work (very limited).

The Judge continued my restriction from owning a gun, although he allowed Helen and Ken Dombeck to keep all their guns. I have never even held a gun except for once, while Ken and Helen have a hunting cabin and no topic of conversation other than what they have killed recently, being the avid self- suffcient survialists they are. Actually they have two additional interests, their collies (who are beautiful) and their secret buying and selling of collie books for profit. Don't ask me why it is a secret.

When we were friendly neighbors Ken always told me their secrets when Helen wasn't around. Then he made a big deal of telling me NOT TO TELL ANYONE. I never understood the reason for secrecy about anything he told me. They both made a big deal of me not telling about their special security devices so "their conversations could not be overheard". I thought that was crazy, in Dodgeville. Later I realized that they were spying on everyone else. Ken made a big deal of me not telling any neighbors that he trapped possums who wandered into his yard from the farm a block away and "took them out to the woods". I thought that was crazy. Now I realize he was also trapping people's pets. Helen keeps urging the DA to have me silenced so I am prevented from telling her secrets.

I think the reason the Court took my right to own guns away, is because it does understand what's been done to me by the Dombecks and the legal system. Moreover, I don't act like I accept it as justice. The Judge understands that if he was persecuted and ruined for the sake of someone who killed someone HE loved, he would be tempted to retaliate. So he orders me not to own a gun. And I am tempted, but I will never shoot the Dombecks or their pets because it is against my idea of what is moral to do. I do not eat the flesh of animals, birds,or fish although I used to be tempted to do it, because it is against my idea of what is moral.

My sense of morality controlls the choices I make in life. I don't own guns; do not want to own guns and I don't need any morally bankrupt Court to order me not to have them.

The Dombecks on the other hand do own guns, actually gave in to the temptation to kill someone else's animal with a gun and Kenneth Dombeck tried to run me down in a car. But after all, the cats drove them crazy.

The Judge talked a long time about how he wants to order me not to write publicly about this matter because that is more harassment for the poor Dombeck's. I told him I was writing a book. He said he would deal with that later.

The Richland County Wisconsin District Attorney Andy Sharp and Judge Lineweber, want to stop me from writing about this case and it has nothing to do with the Dombecks. This is another way the legal system protects itself. The courts refuse to alow the people to question candidates for the bench and they also insulate themself from scrutiny by imposing gag orders on defendants who are being victimized by the system. The courts allow settlements which prevent victims from warning others about defective products. Victims, most of whom cannot even get to court for compensation, are broke by the time of the settlement stage and have to take these settlements.

You cannot reform what you do not understand. And if they only let people speak to you in THEIR lanuage of legobabble, they can be certain that very few of you will understand. This insures that those elected again and again are the sort who will protect property and the elite against the people and all other life on the planet.

Do you know what disorderly conduct is? It is used to fine people who swear in public or at a cop. Freedom of speech my ass. You lost freedom of speech a long time ago America and you slept through it. The only freedom of speech that is protected is the freedom of corporations to "speak" in campaign ads directly before elections. Freedom of speech exists for money, not people-certanly not for victims of power.

If the Judge doesn't stop me from telling this story the DA wants to have me labeled crazy so the book will not be credible. In fact, so no account I tell will be credible.

But it is more than that. By their values, hell by mass culture values, I AM crazy. To their way of thinking, sheltering six cats that came to my door for food IS crazy. Taking out ads in the newspaper to expose animal abusers and cops who will not investigate animal abuse, IS crazy. Losing money and your law license over cats-why you are so crazy you should be put into an in-patient mental hospital.

But the real story is told by the fact that neither the Judge nor the prosecutor ever even thought about ordering Dombeck to have a mental exam. There are so many studies linking animal abusers to other violent crime that this is simply inexcusable in terms of the public safety. They let him keep his guns, and never examined his mental health. This was the Iowa County DA Eric Peterson. Then his appointed special prosecutor and former boss, Andy Sharp tries to convince the town that I am the crazy person. And we elect them again and again.

Life is long, Andy. What goes around, comes around. Four days before the election (your friend and assistant) Eric Peterson's supporters paid for a mailing that misrepresented a case of the then DA Smith, in order to plant the belief, in the minds of the voters, that she was soft on child abuse. It worked. Smith was defeated and Eric Peterson was elected Iowa County DA. This is something Andy is afraid will happen to him.

Coming soon, what Kenneth Dombeck was sentenced for actually killing and wounding the cats. I want to wait and get his actual judgment of conviction so I can be absolutely accurate. Its' a hoot!

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When blood's in the water;
it is best to be the Shark

My lawyers would not treat my case as an animal rights case that needed to be won on appeal. They would not learn the details of the ordeal, which is the only way to win. They felt they wanted to stay away from those details. I should have hired a different attorney as soon as I found out mine was allergic to cats.

They were primarily criminal defense attorneys and this case was beyond their grasp. So I am hiring an animal rights attorney for the rest of this action. In interviewing him I discovered he too was an activist in the seventies and we know many of the same people from those days. I immediately felt in the right place when I walked into his office.

For months I have been trying to show my attorneys what needed to be done and they responded as if I were crazy and wasting their time. Their valuable time. I was overjoyed to find that the new attorney is also doing another case in Dodgeville where a neighbor killed a puppy and threw it over a cliff. That trial will be held April 30th and May 1, 2002 in the Dodgeville Courthouse at 222 Iowa Street. Maybe you can get a sense of what it is like for animals in this cesspool of a town, from the fact that owners have to hire their own attorneys to get any kind of justice for animals in Dodgeville, Wisconsin.

Wisconsin is the state where a DNR supervisor beat a lost cat to death with a pipe and a Dane County court said it was justified or rather "legal" because the state exempts their agencies from the animal abuse laws. Wisconsin is the state where a football coach's son (Barry Alverez) got 10 days in jail (during the holidays) for slowly cooking a live parrot in a microwave oven. The parrot belonged to his roommate. Alverez was mad at his roommate.

Alverez got 10 days for burning to death a live parrot, have you seen my sentence for walking into a neighbor's yard to save a kitten?

The person I admire most in the Animal Rights Movement is Gary Francione. Below is an excerpt from an interview with him. Do yourself a big favor and go read the whole thing here:
www.theanimalspirit.com/garyfrancione.html 

"FoA: You are a law professor. What do you say to those who maintain that your views are specific to someone trained by the legal profession?

Gary Francione: I have no illusions about the usefulness of the legal system. Veterinary malpractice cases, cruelty cases, and cases brought under the Animal Welfare Act are pretty much meaningless in terms of reducing suffering, and have absolutely no effect on the property status of animals. 

But they have created job security for lawyers. Anna Charlton, who has taught the animal rights law course with me at Rutgers University for over a decade, often points out that the legal system will never respond differently to animal issues unless and until there is a significant shift in prevailing social consensus about animal exploitation. 

For the most part, the law reflects social attitudes and does not form them. This is particularly true when the behavior in question is deeply embedded in the cultural fabric, as our exploitation of animals undoubtedly is. 

As long as most people think that it’s fine to eat animals, use them in experiments, or use them for entertainment purposes, the law is not likely to be a particularly useful tool to help animals. If, for example, Congress or a state legislature abolished factory farming, that would drive the cost of meat up and there would be a social revolt! 

There are some lawyers, such as those involved with the Animal Legal Defense Fund, who promote the notion that law will be at the forefront of social change for animals. But these people make a living from practicing law and they are not likely to say otherwise, are they?

Nonhumans will continue to be exploited until there is a revolution of the human spirit, and that will not happen without visionaries trying to change the paradigm that has become accustomed to and tolerant of patriarchal violence. At this moment, the job of the animal rights lawyer is not to be the primary force for change within the system. As lawyers, we are part of the system that exists to protect property interests.

William Kunstler, although the most prominent civil rights lawyer of the 20th century, nevertheless once said to me that I should never think that the lawyer is the "star" of the show. Our job as lawyers is to keep social activists out of harm's way. 

In my view, a useful "animal rights" lawyer is a criminal lawyer one day, helping activists who are charged with civil disobedience; an administrative lawyer the next day, helping activists obtain permits for demonstrations; and a constitutional lawyer the next day, helping students who do not want to vivisect as part of their course work, or helping prisoners who want vegan food. 

But the lawyer always serves and protects the activist. It is the activist who helps to change the paradigm. Without committed clients who reflect a growing social consensus, lawyers are useless.

Inasmuch as I maintain the necessity of revolution, let me make clear what I mean. I am absolutely and unequivocally opposed to any sort of violence directed toward humans or nonhuman. 

I am firmly committed to the principle of non-violence. 

The revolution I seek is one from the heart: I try to get people -- especially other men -- to question and reject violence. 

I am interested in overthrowing patriarchy and the idea that some beings -- whether white, rich males or white males or humans generally --have greater worth than other beings."

Animal Rights Lawyers talk about their Work

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"With the bunnies, in the meadow
(To Live Outside the Law, You Must Be Honest)"

"So you just go scamper off and frolic in the meadow with bunnies, little camper" 

At first this statement above, said with contempt for me, made me angry but I have learned whenever my anger is triggered, truth is around the corner. Then, afterward, just as if all of nature wanted to drive the point home, I found a tiny lost real bunny in front of my house.

Photos
(opens a new browser window) 

It was obviously on its own for the first time. I picked it up and carried it to safety in the back yard by water. My yard is not lawn, but prairie flowers, prairie grasses, mulberry trees, shrubs, (arrowroot, bayberries-many berry shrubs), 30 evergreens, birch, cherry trees and black walnut trees. The flowers, ah the flowers and herbs...wild roses, lilies of the valley, wild indigo, golden alexander, bergamot, prairie phlox, rattlesnake master, blazing star, catnip, oregano, sweet basil, chives, wild violets, white culver, wild strawberries, shooting star, New England asters, ox-eye sunflowers, coreopsis, great blue lobelia and coneflowers. There is also nicotina, jasmine and other sweet smelling, night blooming flowers. I set water out in shallow bowls all over the yard for the little ones who cannot reach up into the bird bath. 

I carried the bunny in my cupped hands, it's heart beating close to my heart, our hearts beating together, all my senses suddenly heightened, feeling its' softness, its' softness pulsing with life. I set it gently down by the water in the grass and flowers. And I knew.

The author of the above statement called me pedantic with a need to feel superior to others. But it is the prosecuting attorneys and judges who need to feel superior to others. The legal profession practically demands those character traits. The legal professional's delight comes from our special knowledge. They make it hard to navigate the legal system so the boys can use their rules and technicalities to defend the guilty/rich and persecute the innocent/poor while they become rich. They are the chosen, oh so very special holders of the truth and the way.

I do not want the life of the man's law, "Real Life", as the author of the above statement put it. He was right, I do want to scamper off and frolic in the meadow with the bunnies. Such an existence is neither simpleminded or a Hallmark Card existence. 

It is the Law and Order crowd in their halls of marble where the pedantic assholes live, - their halls of marble are the Hallmark Card of illusion, not the meadows. The Law and Order crowd only go to the meadow to kill for sport. 

Yes, I choose the meadow and the bunnies. God loves the child who has her own. 

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Packing

A friend is going to help me pack thursday and friday. I will put some of this stuff in storage to make the house easier to sell. For a few minutes today I was just happy. I thought, I am happy. I have not felt this way for at least two years. It is a feeling of innocent giggles and it elevates the spirit. I remember it and then I can feel it again. This move will be so good for me.

Photos of my house before I left
(opens a new browser window)

I have so much to do before I even put the house on the market but at least I am starting.

I have often wondered why it takes me so long to move away from an obviously bad situation. It is a combination of laziness, fear of the unknown, feeling things will just be the same wherever I go. I have the negative belief that I generate this bad luck with the personality I have or my attitude and behavior. Hopelessness. Fear that I will just get myself in a worse situation. Other people leave at the first sign of trouble. 

I have to work on escape as a life skill I need. I have to start enjoying and looking forward to change and upheaval. Because when there is a bad feeling, things do not get better-they only get worse. I should leave, after all I sure know how to do that in relationships.

I am still sick from that sub and chips yesterday. 

Table of contents - top of page

Animal Law in Wisconsin

I will try to list animal cases of interest here but for now, See: Rabideau vs.City of Racine wherein he argued that we "share the earth" as part of his winning argument.

Felder v Casey 139 wis 2d 614 (1987)
Bell v City of Mil 746 F 2d 1205, 1270 (7th Cir. 1984)

Wis Stats. sec. 895.46

Schirk v Herlik. 689 F. Supp 861 (E.D. Wis. 1988)
police entry into private home and beating - atty fees

Carey v Piphus, 435 U.S. 247 (1978)

The State Crime lab matched the bullets fired from Dombeck’s gun to the bullets in Sparky and Theia. There are only four rooms in the dombeck house and Helen and Ken are never apart, yet she was not charged although she was obviously standing right next to him when he shot them.   If he was in his yard, not in the house then the kittens were in MY yard when he shot them.  We will never know because the Iowa County DA Peterson bargained down the charges to 1 count of Disorderly Conduct and did not force him to recite the details of his crime.  He stood mute and pled No Contest.

The Iowa County DA, Eric Peterson, bargained down Dombeck’s 2 charges to a disorderly and Dombeck was fined $700.00.   Dombeck was ordered to pay me $50.00 restitution for Sparky’s vet bills.  That is all that happened to him.  I never got the $50.00.

Although the police deny any previous trouble with the Dombecks consistently to this day, I finally obtained Dombeck’s record and found he has a previous domestic disorderly.

Two more of my cats were killed after Dombeck was sentenced for killing Sparky, each killed one day after a hearing, Magic and Wanda.

However , the Dombecks stopped using bullets. The kittens were allegedly "run over".

Magic: my darling, was killed.  Police found  her in the center of the gutter directly in front of Dombeck’s driveway one day after I asked  at a hearing for his guns to be confiscated.

(The message from the Dombecks being - We don’t need guns)

Wanda: A old feral who came to live under my porch in my fenced yard, who never left yard, slept most of the time and ate the food I provided.  I found the gate opened in the night, I found her killed, found her in the gutter in front of Dombeck’s house, a day after his sentencing.

Valentino disappeared:  A stray who did not live with me but who I had neutered and vaccinated - last time I saw him the skin was torn off ½ his face.

Later, Ken Dombeck attempted to run ME down as I stood in the street in front of my house. The police chief who I had publicly accused of being soft on animal abuse, arrested me when I called the police - for "harassing Ken".  They kept me in the drunk tank all day - dragged me through the courthouse chained at the waist and feet. They never conducted any investigation into the truth of Ken and Helen's statements.  Helen was not in the car although she swore later that she was in the car, in order to bolster Ken's story.  Ken was driving in the opposite direction of his work at Lands End although he said they were on their way to work.  No, the only reason Ken came racing down the street with his lights off laughing that morning at 5:30 a.m., was to show me what he did to my cats.

I began guarding my cats with a hyper-villgilance and Ken could not get at them.  He began calling in Harassment complaints.  One afternoon while watching the cats in the yard I saw Ken come out to play with the poisons he keeps in his shed.  As he held them up and poured them from one container to the other laughing, I called the cats to come into the house (by now I had them trained to come when I called).  Come babies, into the house, the killer's outside.  I called 2 or 3 times.

The next morning the cops were at the door.  I asked them what they wanted and they said they were there to arrest me for "harassing" Ken Dombeck.  I slammed the door and they forced it open.  They charged in, and while I was asking for an arrest or search warrant, one of them beat me into semi-consciousness.  They charged me with battery and resisting.  My trial is Feb. 21.  I will not deal.  I am innocent.

I want to ask the appellate court to review the standard of proof and evidence necessary to obtain a harassment injunction.

I want them or the judicial commission to raise the standard when abusers or their associates (boyfriend, husband, domestic partner, etc.) are attempting to obtain harassment injunctions against their victims.

Below are the reasons I did not appeal the injunction in a timely fashion.

Virginia Rose Ray did not appeal the granting of the injunction because:

This victim was severely traumatized after the first shootings which occurred on 09/11/2000,

And further shocked by the fact that the police considered the crime no big deal and would not investigate until she applied pressure to them and other agencies.  She was severely traumatized when the chief of police then began a campaign of persecution against her to show Virginia was at fault for her cats being killed by the Dombecks;

Not until October was the Dombeck kill confirmed, and,

 Virginia had found another kitten, Gaia, harmed in the meantime, and was dealing with the injury, a dislocated hip; and,

She and her cats were being unrelentingly, verbally and physically threatened by Ken Dombeck during that time between 9/11/2000  and 12/15/2000 (cats kicked and pressure hosed while she, forbidden to come in the yard, had to stand at the border and watch) and

She was in shock, distracted and depressed by her obligation to protect her animals from an emerging, continuing threat, without police assistance, and,

1. I did all I could to prevent the cats from going into the prohibited yard after the injunction was granted in Dec. of 2000.

At great financial hardship, I built a fence for four thousand dollars the following spring, April - May 2001 and covered it with black plastic having heard cats cannot climb plastic.

And when the fence did not work to protect them, (they didn’t have to climb-they can jump 8 feet from a sitting position, who knew?).  Dombeck could get under, over and through said fence at will and he wanted to prove he had a "reason" to shoot my cats.

I kept the cats locked in the house from July 2001, except for incidents I could not prevent (I was so afraid of what the Dombecks  did when I was not home, that I had my stroked-out mother come to live with me.  But she was so slow in opening and closing the door that the cats ran out while she was doing it)  and for special occasions when just one or two went outside and I could control them.

2. We were not allowed to present evidence of those above efforts other than that I built a fence. (or at least my attys did not present evidence that the cats had been kept in the house since July of 2001 and when, disgusted with the attys, I tried to introduce it at sentencing, the Court would not listen to it).

3. Nor were we allowed to present evidence of continuing harm to my cats including two more cat deaths, or the death of several strays that did not live with me but that I had neutered and vaccinated.

4. Nor were we allowed to present evidence that the cops would not protect me by investigating those deaths.

5. Nor present evidence that the police chief believed no one should have more than two cats and was using me as an example at city council meetings.  I was not notified that I would be discussed at said meetings. 

6. We were not allowed to present evidence by an animal behaviorist that the cats might have been trained to stay out of Dombeck's yard if not for the reinforcing effect of the injunction which preventing me from removing the cats once they made it to the Dombeck yard.

7. We were not allowed to present evidence:

that when the cats escaped from the house after July it was unavoidable;

8. Nor was I allowed to present evidence that the Dombecks lured the cats out of the yard directly, although the facts did come out at the trial in a jumbled way.

I told the story of catching Ken luring them and seeing Helen opening the gate but my attys did not make the point, in summation, that these actions resulted in some of the cat's trespasses and for sure one trapping. The police were called by me after witnessing a luring by Ken and then they found a cat in the Dombeck's house.But they just gave me two tickets for municipal ordinance violations, trespassing and animal running and impounded my cat who was later found to have a bullet wound near his anus. They did not investigate Dombeck or take my complaint.

At my trial for violating the restraining order, DA Andrew Sharp was standing up attacking my credibility, shouting why didn't I bring to court the picture of Helen opening the gate if I had taken one as I claimed.   But she quickly began to try to attract his attention as she knew I had taken a picture of her doing it.  I said, "look at your client Mr Sharp" and he leaned over while she whispered to him.  After that he dropped all demands that I prove she opened the gate.

9. In any case, the jury instructions allowed no justification of my actions in violating the restraining order.

The only thing the jury was allowed to see was the following jury instructions:

Did she do what the injunction said not to do? Go into their yard?

If so, find her guilty.

ATTACKING THE ORIGINAL INJUNCTION

Acknowledging it is established law that there can be no collateral attack on the legitimacy of the original injunction in the appeal of a conviction for violating the injunction:

Here in this particular case, there is an opportunity and need for the Appellate Court, in novel but important circumstances, to check the circuit court's use of the injunction statutes for inappropriate and statutorily unintended purposes.

The appellate court should review the standards used to grant this injunction because:

The Richland County circuit court judge clearly abused his discretion in granting the injunction:

As an aside, the restraint imposed does not really even seem relevant to the incidents of harassment Helen complained of in the petition. She said I threatened to kill her dogs - she said I threw rocks at her - she never complained of these alleged acts to the police or anyone else because they never happened.  She had no proof that I did these things because they NEVER HAPPENED.

The Appeals Court should, despite the lack of a timely appeal, look at the standard this circuit court used to grant criminals the original injunction which restrained the victim of their crime from protecting herself and her dependants from further crimes by them.

I want to alert the Court to the consequences of the use of the injunction statute in this type of case and suggest the Court should order the use of a higher standard of proof in these circumstance before more criminals seek to use the injunction statue to retaliate against those who make complaints against them.

For social policy reasons concerning:

the desirability of enforcing the animal anti-cruelty laws and exposing animal abusers who often escalate their behavior to other less powerful entities; (victims will be afraid to report without protection)

and to prohibit the use of the injunction to retaliate against victims who make complaints;

the Appellate Court should review the grant of this injunction even though it was not appealed before Virginia Rose Ray was convicted of violating it.

The Appellate Court should review the grant of this injunction:

and:

1. Set a higher standard of proof for abusers; (i.e. greater weight not preponderance) than that required from non-abusers who seek to restrain a harasser.

2. Helen Dombeck got that injunction with no evidence to support her allegations.  The judge stated that he could grant with a low standard. The Appeals court should find that to avoid contravening the purpose of the harassment statutes, in cases where the petitioner has committed a crime against the defendant, there must be some corroborating documentary or witness evidence of harassment required, other than the testimony of the criminal or their family members and friends. (Such as timely police reports, doctor bills, medical records, etc.)

3. Or, the Court might prohibit altogether the use of the injunction statute by an abuser against a victim.

4. The Appellate Court should require the Circuit Court to examine the restraints requested by the abuser to determine and find:

The above standards should be imposed by the appeals court to insure the circuit court is not being used for retaliation or is a party to retaliation.

ARGUMENT:

Helen complained in the petition of specific incidents which if they had actually occurred would have absolutely resulted in a call to the police.

There were NO calls to the police documented and no police reports because the incidents were fabricated to fit the requirements of the statute printed on the face of the petition form Helen filled out.

The idea was, if she could get an injunction preventing me from retrieving the kittens the dombecks could take pictures while the kittens dawdled in their yard , that would show at Ken's trial, that they were so badly harassed by the 5 month old kittens who were in their yard all the time (now older and not as cute) that they HAD to shoot them.  (There were actually only seven incidents before AND after Ken's trial when the cats ran into their yard total in the entire 2 year ordeal).

However, because of the vet's description of the painful agonizing long death of Sparky from a bullet in his spine  they decided not to go to trial and instead accepted the sweet deal offered by DA Peterson, which resulted in a  no contest plea to Disorderly Conduct from Ken Dombeck.

Then, they decided to trap the kittens and punish me while they played the victim.   I think they set out to force me to move hoping the community would forget they killed people's pets --- after I was gone.

The circuit court should not have granted injunction to an abuser like Helen without seeing police reports concerning the complaints she made on her petition. God knows they sure expect any woman asking for a domestic abuse restraining order to have called the police and to produce police reports to verify her claim of being beaten.  Helen then would never have been granted the restraining order because she never called the police over the things she claimed I did.  They were fabrications to get the order.

On the contrary, although Helen presented no evidence, I testified at the injunction hearing of cruelty to the animals including, after Sparky was shot and before the cops bothered to investigate, hearing Gaia screaming from their locked garage, going in there to retrieve her and finding her in a closed cardboard box.

She was still 5 months old.

A few weeks later, I found her with a dislocated hip at the back of my property. I could have produced all the vet reports but I thought the evidence which I did present (when the judge reviewed the DA's complaint against the Dombecks) that the bullets in his gun matched those in the cats, would be enough. But now I wonder if the judge actually read that.  However, I know that he would have granted the injunction no matter what evidence I presented.  His bias is toward the protection of property not animals.

The DA's complaint contained the report from the crime lab matching the bullet from Sparky to Dombeck's gun, and the DA's warrant for his arrest because Ken Dombeck did not show up for arrangement ( but they NEVER actually arrested him, the chief refused to do it as he was working with the Dombecks at the time to help them get the restraining order.  The chief just told him to show up at the rescheduled hearing).Compare this to what the chief did to me with no warrant. 

At the Injunction hearing, before those documents were submitted, Helen denied that her husband was wanted for shooting cats and those documents impeached her.

Trespassing in an empty yard by an individual just to retrieve trespassing cats who are in danger from the yard owners is not harassment.    At the time Helen was granted an injunction I had done that to retrieve a screaming Gaia from their garage which they did not see and to get a kitten out of their garden.

There are trespassing laws they could and did use to punish me when the kittens "harassed" the Dombecks and I crossed the property line to grab them and bring them home.

Municipal trespassing and animal running ordinances which result in heavy fines all of which hurt me financially since they would double and triple ticket me for the one offence. 

I have huge fines from these municipal tickets to pay. They would always double ticket me when the cats went in the Dombeck’s yard and the fines were $300.00 and more plus the impoundment fines.

There was no need to use the inappropriate harassment injunction.

The use of the harassment statute without any proof of harassment contravenes the intent of the statute in that it affords the opportunity for criminals to attack, retaliate, punish and intimidate the original victim or even her witnesses.

RETALIATION:

In my case, the Dombecks made two subsequent false complaints; one of violating the injunction and one of bail jumping against me when I complained about their continued killing of more cats. (2 were killed during the process of bringing him to trial and one AFTER he was convicted, another just disappeared) .

My complaints about these killings were not even investigated although the cats were found in the Dombeck's driveway and in front of their house but the Dombeck's complaints, because they had an injunction, resulted in:

two all day stay in the dirtiest jail on earth, (from which I got head lice) and

the humiliation of being dragged through the courthouse in wrist and ankle chains, and,

a cop beating me up when he came to arrest me for the second false complaint made by the Dombecks and

Costs to me of $28,000.00 in legal fees so far;

and the loss of my home and profession;

and my mental health.

All of this happened to me based only on Ken Dombeck's false statements that I violated the injunction his WIFE Helen obtained.

Ken was never present in the courtroom during the injunction hearing and did not support her testimony. The injunction covered him anyway although he was not a petitioner. He, however, initiated the false complaints that I violated the injunction. But Helen always supports him so she can testify in court and they do not have to produce him as a witness.

Double injustice, just like she was there when he shot the cats, yet was never charged as a party to the crime, although I asked the DA to charge her as well as him.

They are both criminals. He lies and she swears to it. They do their dirt as a team.

But far worse, the state court, by issuing that injunction assisted them in their continuing criminality and retaliatory abuse and that was never the intent of the harassment statutes.

In fact, that is the exact opposite of the intent of the statute.

I want to make clear we are asking for three separate requirements to prevent retaliatory use of the injunction statutes:

That No injunction is granted to an abuser against the victim without:

1. the petitioner meeting the greater weight of the evidence standard of proof;

2. and corroborating evidence of harassment other than the abuser's testimony or the testimony of her associates;

3. and the Court's recorded findings as to why the restraints granted do not endanger the victim or limit her ability to protect herself, her dependants, and her property.

Or we ask that in lieu of these above limits and better yet, that Injunctions against victims be unavailable to their abusers.

Perhaps it is good I did not appeal the injunction, for that allows us all to view in full the consequences of allowing criminals who lie under oath and are impeached publicly to get injunctions against their victims.

CONSEQUENCES:

The granting of an injunction under these circumstances; against a victim of crime, insures that the victim will be treated more harshly than the abuser.

Will you look at a comparison of our sentences?

I got 3 years probation, 60 hours community service and a prohibition against owning a gun, but worst of all and totally without a legal basis, the judge threatened to impound the cats if there was one more trespassing incident by a cat and he said all Helen had to do is call him and tell him there had been a trespass, no evidence needed (just like obtaining the injunction) and he would immediately order the cats impounded and presumably kill them.

Knowing she would lie, had lied from day one and was a convincing liar, and based on her lies the judge would kill the cats after all I had suffered to protect them, I understood this was a circuit court order to move or have my cat's killed by the state.

A get out of town Order.

The end of my dwindling practice, the end of my finances, the End.

By May of 2002, I was moved out of Dodgeville, the house on the market. It has taken until this month of 2003 to sell at a greatly reduced price, no one wanting to live next door to these people.

When the judge threatened to kill my cats, I resolved, if it took me the rest of my life, I would have justice.

On the other hand, Domeck kept all his guns, did no community service, was charged less in fines and restitution for killing and terrorizing the cats than I was for loving them. I do not think he received any probation.

Which brings me to my biggest point -  all my fines, restitution and court costs .

The circuit court ordered me to pay Helen $300.00 for the pictures she took, and imposed a fine and court costs in addition to the above sentence.

Helen presented no proof of costs. She just said it cost me $300.00.

I was awarded restitution of $50.00 for Sparky's medical bills which I never received.

The judge found I was not entitled to all the money I spent on Sparky before they killed him. I had him neutered and vaccinated at four months. The DA refused to give me back my pictures of the dead Sparky.

Probation costs are $20.00 a week? or a month?  I am not sure as I don't pay them as I have not worked since I moved away from Dodgeville.  Three psychologists have confirmed that I have Post Traumatic Shock Disorder.

Compare what happened to me to what happened to the Dombecks and tell me whether you agree that we must try to use this case to limit the legal system's ability to abuse victims of animal abuse.

Tell me if you agree with me that the circuit court here abused its' discretion and needs to be reigned in by a higher court.

We must try here to limit and redirect state power to place animal life above property rights.  We must substitute mediation as a requirement for neighborhood dispute before court involvement so that witnesses will be available when court action is required..

This sort of thing has happened to other animal welfare people under different circumstances but my case presents a good  opportunity to obtain new standards.

EVIDENCE

A word to the wise. Helen brought a ton of pictures into court to prove my cats were in her yard all the time, although my cats were in her yard seven times. But every time they did go in her yard or even if other cats were in her yard, the Dombecks took a roll of pictures. More if they had time. None of these pictures were dated. None had any proof of when they were taken but my lawyers did not ask one question about those pictures. 

Make sure your lawyer does question them. These pictures look bad and if unchallenged will distort the truth.

The victim better invest in a video camera system to monitor her backyard. I know this sounds crazy, expensive and extreme. Especially, after you install a fence and cat fence-in system. Yet, by now, I have spent over $30,000.00 on lawyers and costs, lost my cats lives, profession and mind. How extreme is that? 

Find the experts and install a system so that you can monitor your yard from inside your house, especially the gates. After I moved from Dodgeville, I googled security systems on-line and they are not even very expensive. Installation will be a hassle but while the installers are digging the post holes for the fence, they can dig the holes for the poles which hold the video monitors.

Table of contents - top of page

Vindication But Not Justice

The Richland Center DA Andrew Sharp asked Judge Leineweber to dismiss all the pending charges against me, all of which were based on the Dombecks false complaints. Before he did that he offered me a deal which I refused. He then wrote a letter to the Court not admitting anything, once again slandering my good name and then he asked the Court to dismiss all the charges against me rather than go to trial.

I still have not been made whole yet but my lawyer and I are discussing how that will be done. There is the matter of the huge costs; and the savings I have lost; and my license. There is the original conviction for violating a restraining order by going in the Dombecks yard to retrieve the cat who escaped the house and went in there. I want a true justice. I want to be made whole.

After 2 bad attorneys, who minimized the offenses against me, called me crazy and refused to do the investigation required, I have been saved by one sharp attorney. After the loss of my profession and all my savings, exhausted and sick with Post Traumatic Shock Disorder, the State Public Defender's Office found me a real attorney. Attorney Steven Cohen, Monona Wisconsin, worked with me through my anger and suspicion with the detached calm of a true professional. And he made the way through.

Cohen did the research I requested, instead of just calling me crazy and I believe those discovery requests uncovered evidence that strengthened the credibility of my assertions. On his own, he did sophisticated legal research, the kind they taught us to do in law school but which I never saw from Bosits or Eisenberg. Those previous attorneys took all my money and did nothing in return. And they called me names to cover their lack of work on my behalf. 

Steven Cohen filed motions which challenged the right of that corrupt Dodgeville police dept. to break into my home and beat me senseless based on the second false complaint of an animal abuser who had never been stopped from killing my cats. Cohen was preparing to challenge the Dombecks' multiple photographs of the same event which made it seem as if my cats lived in their yard. There were only seven instances of my cats going into their yard and four of those times the Dombecks lured them in there.

when I was a child  I played with the boys  and (because I was only a girl)  they made me be the Indians my name was Fox Woman and they hunted me  like dogs my name was  White Bird and I flew to escape them my name was Last Star the last  of my people my name was Sunset for they caught me  and burned me my name was  Won't Talk for I never betrayed us time after time the boys shot me down and I came back Red Witch wild and chanting came back Ghost Dance came back Bad Dream came back Cant Forget and Crazy-With-Grief I know where they went those boys with their guns they're still hunting Indians look you can see their names are Spills Blood and Kills-Without-Mercy *

None of these things had ever been done by the attorneys who took all the money I had and left me penniless and broken clinging to the animals I was trying to protect. The DA never investigated the Dombecks false complaints. He just blindly persecuted me based on his belief that cats should never be allowed to go outside. 

His belief was that I was the cause of the kittens deaths for allowing them out in my fenced back yard. This was his belief despite my continued complaints to the police that the Dombecks were luring the cats, opening the gates and lifting the bottom of the weld wire fence. The DA constantly referred to my "mental problems" as if they were not caused by the Dombecks continued cat killings and the local police's refusal or inability to protect me. The system, unable to protect me, blamed me. This happens a lot.

Attorney Cohen, on the other hand, asked to see the Dombecks work schedule on the day they claimed to be going to work as an excuse for Ken trying to run me down with his car. In the early morning twilight, I was crossing the street in front of my own house looking for a cat taken from my home the day before while I was at a hearing. Ken's car came racing down on me before I could realize what was happening. It was so fast and without headlights and it was on me before my mind registered "car".

Ken tried to run over me or just scare me or show me what he did to my cats when he stopped using bullets. Then, when I called the police, as usual the Chief blamed me. The Dodgeville Police Chief Cahoon ordered me arrested for alledgedly harassing Ken Dombeck. While I was being handcuffed, Ken's friend and protector, the police chief was screaming at me, his spit hitting me in the face, ranting about those good people, the Dombecks. I was remembering how my cats were found in the gutter in front of Ken's garage, run over by a car. 

Ken was alone in that car when he came racing at me with his lights out in the twilight. While they had me handcuffed in front of my own house, Helen lied and said she too was in Ken's car. You see, Ken was not scheduled to be at work that day so they had to come up with a reason for his racing down the street that morning. Helen said he was taking her to work. She said I lept out of the bushes in my yard, a good ten to twelve feet away, and jumped at their car in the middle of the street. That is how I came to be in front of their car in the middle of the road before they saw me. That is why "they" almost ran over me. Any minimally alert police investigator would have laughed themselves sick at this blatant absurdity. 

In fact, the officer handcuffing me told me later that he did not know why I was arrested. He was just following the Chief's orders. He told me he had no idea how to fill out the papers. I showed him the restraining order and how nothing that night could have been construed as a violation of it. He looked sick and ashamed. Later, the DA said it wasn't a violation of the restraining order, it was bail-jumping. 

I knew they would lose if it ever got to court. So did the DA. I did not realize that the idea was to keep making false complaints until the sheer weight of them combined with continual references to my "mental problems" would win a conviction for the DA.

I was breaking mentally, was feeling so guilty because I kept losing the cats to those monsters. I had no external support and they had the power of the state. I began to doubt what I was seeing and experiencing. 

I started thinking, maybe I am crazy and I gave up and retreated to my house. But even there I was not safe from monsters whose evil was being fed by a protective legal system. Nothing I did was the right thing. Nothing could protect us. And everyone, in one way or another, was condemning me, excusing them, including the so called animal rights organizations. 

Alan Eisenberg my lawyer wanted an easy eight thousand dollars by pleading me guilty by mental defect. No big deal he said. In the meantime the Dombecks kept killing and making false complaints. Even after I moved they kept making complaints to anyone who would listen. Then Eisenberg's license was suspended and of course he refused to return any of my money. He turned me over to one of his friends who withdrew from representation at the first hearing. That is how Eisenberg managed to steal the money I paid him.

But Attorney Steven Cohen through the State Public Defenders office protected me when I was totally stripped of money and dignity. 

And I learned my lessons; about how the police are not our friends; how the District Attorneys use the weak as career stepping stones, how they never admit they made a mistake even when there is overwhelming evidence that they did. What hypocrisy pervades the entire "justice" system. I learned about how many innocent are found guilty (I would say 40% of the people in prison are either innocent, or there for petty, no-victim offences such as drugs, refusing to turn in their friends on drug charges, or for being poor or for being beat up by the cops and then charged with felonies to CTCA. 

And we pay for all the employment this creates with our taxes. 

How many videos do you need of black and white people being savagely beaten by police to convince you that they will abuse you and your children if they get the chance? Another innocent person beaten into brain damage last week in Milwaukee by 12 off duty cops at a party. Ooops they came to the wrong party. Another 13 year old tasered into shock at his own school as he screamed for his mother. Oooops a case of mistaken identity. Another person suffocated with a plastic bag over his head in the back of a Wisconsin squad car. Ooops the wrong kind of bag. 

How many more rights do we lose while we ignore the sins of the legal system so we can believe the myth that the cops are keeping us safe? 

Everyone knows a good cop, a cop who did the right thing. I do.

In fact, I know a lot of very fine cops, good people. Honest cops who try to keep straight amidst very challenging conditions. I believe a cop who refused to lie for the one who beat me up is one of the reasons the DA asked that all the charges against me be dismissed. I cannot prove this, but I believe it. 

But that does not make me feel better about the disgusting abuses of the system. 

The innocent are crushed in the system. The innocent are easier to convict than the guilty, because the innocent do not believe they will be found guilty by their peers. They trust in their innocence, because they have righteous anger, because they are innocent. The guilty know better and they have more experience with the system. 

Remember Martha Stewart who panicked and made a small mistake which she immediately corrected? But the boys have careers and she was easy prey compared to the guilty, pension stealing, big-time presidential contributors. The boys will receive promotions for years for what they did to her.

I want you to open your eyes and be afraid. We need to bring the controllers under control, the Judges, DAs and Police. Before we have a police state. We need to open the prison doors, free the non-violent, innocent and make restitution for the waste of their lives. We need to get victimless crimes off the books. We need to believe that people can be innocent even if they are caught and dragged through the legal system. 

We need to put people and animals and children's safety as the FIRST priority of the legal system. Now the first priority is the protection of property, and the more property you have, the more rights and respect you get from the legal system.

We need to open the judicial election system and have done with the Judges refusal to allow the public to see their decisions and talk about their behavior in the courtroom. We need to look at the Judges organizations. We need safeguards and checks outside the legal system such as citizen oversight committees not made up of their friends, relatives, retired and contributors.

We need to look at how the system bankrupts people, causing them to plead guilty when they are innocent. And that is not just the court costs and defense fees, but how you are forced to pay for probation supervision and restitution ( to cat killers for phony pictures while the abusers never pay for vet bills or the costs of their ongoing terror). When you cannot afford to assert your innocence because of the cost, there is no legal system for you. Is it any wonder the law is held in such contempt by the poor?

We need to know that just because the Man says something is a crime, that doesn't make it true. Look closely at what people are charged with when you read the newspaper. Do you think what they are alleged to have done is actually criminal? Make independent judgments as to whether the charge is appropriate and remember the name of the District Attorney. Be aware of all the non-criminal ways there are to avoid criminally charging people, such as municipal fines and forfeitures. 

It is very expensive taxpayers, to criminalize accidents. "Tough" on non-violent crime just ends up being tough on all our wallets.

Special Note: The charges against me were dismissed in February 2005, and on April 14, 2005 this story about the cop, Lt. Ron Gratz , who wrote biased police reports about me, eventually beat me up and lied to the DA about me hitting him first, was posted on the Ch 3000 website.

DODGEVILLE, Wis. -- He is second in command at the Dodgeville Police Department, a school liaison officer, and an assistant football and baseball coach at Dodgeville's High School. 

Now Lt. Ron Gratz is the target of a state criminal investigation in Iowa County. 

Gratz has been suspended with pay from both his police and coaching duties. 

He is an 11-year veteran of the force and well-known in the local sports community. Those close to the investigation told News 3 the probe started after Gratz allegedly sent a questionable photograph by e-mail to several male students. 

Now state agents have searched his home -- seizing his computers, adult pornography, documents, records and photographs. 

In addition to the state criminal investigation, Dodgeville police and the school district are each conducting their own internal examinations. 

Full story is here: www.channel3000.com/news/4381126/detail.html 

My surviving darlings and their pride mates are safe now I think, because I know how to protect them. The bad guys still did sometimes attack us in various ways even at my new home although we are very protected now. If we are attacked again, I know how to turn the tables now and I am no longer alone. 

My story, the Cat's story is below. I never gave up trying to help them and we are safe now. I will not forget what happened to us.

The Owl crushes the snake.
Come little ones, into the house. 
Evening brings all things home.
Power to those who stand 
between the abuser and his prey. 
Victory to us 
and 
Joy in the Struggle. 
We are not Alone.
We Are With Each Other
and Them..

To Dance beneath the Diamond Sky with one hand waving Free

I think it is so important that all new readers see and read this entry. Tell other people. 

Your cats should always have several ways to get out of your house and be safe in your backyard until you can get to them. Just in case something bad happens (like a fire) and you are not there. And now there is a way to make this possible! 

This entry is also for people who do not want other people's cats in their yard. Take some responsibility yourself. You may have more money than the offender. You can build a fence rather than starting a war with your neighbors. Read On.......

My cats are safe outside at last! 

Most people know what horror I and my cats have suffered since 9/11/2000, when neighbors shot my 5 month old kittens for target practice and never stopped killing them after that.  

I moved away from that house and that city when the legal system refused to protect me and instead persecuted me, saying I was just as bad as the animal abusers because I, like everyone else in that city of 4,000 people, let my cats go outside. I, however, had the misfortune to live next door to Mr. and Mrs. Satan from Hell.

Get this people - the victim of animal abuse is not as bad as the abusers. She did not "ask for it". You condone and excuse animal abuse when you have that attitude. You blame the victim and excuse the abuser. No one is responsible for animal abuse but the abuser. And believe me, they enjoy it and are always looking for an excuse to do it. Don't help them excuse their cruelty. 

Cats have a right and a need to be outside in nature and nothing they do gives anyone the right to hurt them. They need the herbs, they need the exercise, they need the experience, and they need the healing power of nature just as we do. The house is just a big cage unless you really turn it into a jungle jim with a lot of eatable cat greens, open windows and fresh water.

NOW THERE IS A WAY TO HAVE IT ALL - THE CATS CAN GO OUTSIDE AND THEY CAN BE SAFE TOO!

I am writing today to announce that, on a six foot wooden fence, the Cat Fence-In System really does work. It can also be put on a chain link fence. I linked to the Cat Fence-In website below and copied some language from their site at the end of this entry. 


THE BASE FENCE

Well you have to put the cat fence-in system on a fence. So you have to fence your yard. A six foot fence is best, wood or chain. I found out a lot of things when I had mine built. Here is some information you might find useful.

First, you have to go to your city clerk, get a fence permit and a picture/drawing of the lot's survey lines. Ask them about the local rules concerning fences. In some places you must not build directly on the lot line. You will be required to leave a fixed measurement of space to allow a person to walk inside your lot line on the other side of your fence without trespassing into your neighbor's yard. This is a good idea and I recommend it whether or not your city requires it but you may want to mark the boundaries of your property with Post Poles directly on the lot lines. That way it will be clear that there is a corridor outside the fence which still belongs to you. If you ever need to repair the fence you may need to work on the outside of it. One of the things that might help you decide on an installer is how much they know about your local requirements. The permit will not be too expensive but the clerk may not volunteer all this info so be sure to ask exactly what rules apply to fence building in your municipality.

The thing I would tell you about having the base fence built, is to tell the builder to place the fence right on the ground. If you do not give specific instructions, they will leave a few inches space and the cats will escape under the fence. 

You can ask them to dig a trench (there is a machine, a trencher, that will do this). Order a fence one-half foot larger than your city's regulations allow, and have the installers place the extra inches in the trench.

However some people say there are problems with trenching. The ground freezing causes fence buckling when part of the fence is underground; other people say this is nonsense. I have no idea.

I had the fence set as close to the ground as possible and then I placed 4x4's along the bottom of it. Perfect! No one even tries to dig out. I did notice the boards seem father apart than when they first came and Lemke said that was because the wood was wetter when it came and as it dried there was some shrinkage. But it is not significant enough shrinkage to allow a cat to escape.

Be sure that the gates are also hung as low as possible.

Be sure the last fence post is placed as close to the house as possible. In accord with the no gap rule, avoid a large gap between the house and first fence post. The post closest to the house should be braced toward the house so it doesn't start leaning away from the house as the concrete dries.

Avoid Wet Wood - Lumber for base fence should be held for at least a month before it is used.

Have them deliver the lumber and let it sit in the garage a month or two before it is used unless they will guarantee that it will not shrink after installation, causing it to have wide spaces between each board.

If the wood is not dry when installed, when the shrinking of the base fence's wood is finished, there may be a gap between the gate and the fence post to which the gate is attached. A gap large enough for a cat to squeeze through. Best to get some guaranteed that the wood has set around long enough to have dried sufficiently so that the subsequent shrinkage is minimal.


THE CAT FENCE-IN SYSTEM

Cats, who are small lions, need exercise; the mental stimulation of the outdoors; the pleasure of eating catnip and cat grasses; rolling in the dust and sleeping in the sun. All animals including cats have a right to the pleasure and comfort of nature. 

But it is simply not safe to let them roam. Remember the group of boys who barbecued a live kitten on an outdoor grill at a party. And remember the Wisconsin tavern party where they tortured a kitten to death for fun and bragged about it later. The jerks own the world and the legal system spits all over victims. 

The latest story I read, was a pet store worker stomping a kitten to death in front of children waiting to buy her. He said she bit him, just like the Wisconsin DNR supervisor said, when he clubbed a cat to death with a pipe. Neither of these jerks did any time or was even fined.

But Of Course, if you live in a huge city and do not have a yard; or if you live paycheck to paycheck as so many of us do; a loving indoor cat home is far better than the alternatives for cats.

But now, if you can build a fence, cats can be given the freedom of a back yard. 

Of course, you will have cat doors on the first floor hopefully in several places; (a window and a door to the back yard). You will NOT have problems with other animals coming in your house because you will have the cat fence to keep them out of the yard.

Dr. Patricia McConnell who has a radio program Calling All Pets has mentioned on the air that there are tubes that can be attached to the second floor windows of a house which lead to a tree in the yard. 

McConnell is a zoologist at UW-Madison and an animal trainer who specializes in non-aversive problem solving. She raises and trains border collies. 

Then Marc Morrone did Martha Stewarts TV show on these tubes and he said the tubes are called Kittywalks and you can see them at www.midnight-pass.com 

I recommend professional installers unless you can actually see the system installed somewhere before you attempt to do it yourself. The trickiest places are the gates and where the fence attaches to the house. There must be no gaps. 

Lemke Fence of Wisconsin, 1-800-242-2009, installed my Cat Fence-In system on the 6 foot wooden fence they built for me. They work all over Wisconsin. I tell you this because most fence companies I called had no experience doing cat fences, and didn't want to try. 

"Put it up yourself after we build the base fence", they said. Yeah right, if I could do that I would just build the whole damn thing myself. 

Lemke had knowledge of the Cat Fence-In system; ordered the system from Cat Fence-In; and agreed to install it. They did warn me that it would be the first time for them. 

I feel it would be better if the fence owner finds the Cat Fence-In website; orders what they need and have it delivered to their home. Then hire the installers.

The boss and president of the Lemke Fence company, Dave, was an OK guy to work with and was committed to getting it right. He came out to view the job after it was done. It was the first time they ever installed the cat fence system. They did not get it right the first time but they came back and kept trying until they did it right. Now they have the experience. But they did not get the gates right and they substituted their own fasteners for the twists sent by cat fence-in. The directions state the net must be tied to the bracket a special way.

I have no stock or any financial interest in either company, not Cat Fence-In or Lemke. My interest is in getting cat owners to see that their cats have a right to the outdoors and the grass and trees. 


Below are some of the problems Lemke Fence and I encountered when trying to install the cat fence in system. Read and remember.

WHICH SYSTEM TO CHOOSE

The producers of the cat fence-in system say the system should be placed at least five feet from the ground but I found that to be misleading. The system should be placed as close to the top of a six foot fence as possible. 

They seem to say that the "stand up combination barrier" should be used to keep unwanted animals out of your yard and the "hang down barrier" should be used to keep your cats in. No No No!

Take my word, I learned the hard way. NEVER, never, use the hang down barrier - it is really for 12 foot fences or attached to the gutters along low roof lines. 

ALWAYS buy the stand up system, called the COMBINATION BARRIER KIT that the creator states is to keep unwanted cats out of your yard. But read carefully. He is actually saying, the combination barrier works great to keep them in too. 

So, no matter if you want to keep the cats out; keep the cats in; or both; use the Combination Barrier Kit and System.

The only place I would use the hang down Strato Barrier is a roof that comes down low to the ground. Mine is only 9 feet from the ground and Wander Cat is giving it the serious looks. The gutters have nails holes every two feet so the strato barrier could be easily attached.

TREE GUARDS

My cats used to go up the tree branches and leap onto the roof from them. 

Then, they would trot over the roof to the other side of the house like a little pride of lions. 
Then, they'd drop from the roof into the FRONT yard, where there is no stinking fence. 

I have very resourceful and intelligent cats. They can jump 8 feet from a sitting position.

So I learned that unless all tree limbs are over 12 feet from roofs, you must use the tree guards provided by the Cat Fence-In System. 

At first, I had a tree-trimming service come and cut the branches back, although I never thought I would ever cut a tree. I don't like to cut branches and make them look unnatural, but the reason I want the cats outside is to exercise vigorously. I want them to be able to climb the trees. So I cut the tree branches back rather than use the tree guards. 

Once I installed the Combination Barrier Cat Fence-In System, and cut the branches back far from MY roof, only one cat seriously tried to get out of the yard and that is Dreamer. The rest became content to stay in the backyard and seem to enjoy it with no desire to leave until Dreamer found a way. 

Dreamer started to leap from a tree limb higher on the tree to a NEIGHBOR'S roof (10 to 12 feet). None of the other cats could bring themselves to try it. 

I doubt if you have a cat like Dreamer. 

(It's a bird, it's a plane, it's WANDER-CAT) 

And the thing is, after he jumped down from the neighbor's roof, he waited right there for me to come and get him and bring him back into my yard. My crazy boy, Beautiful Dreamer. 

Go to my home page called Spiraling Cycle or to the green Index at the bottom of this page - click on the May Day Holiday, and it will open to a picture of the feral Luna and her babies. Luna had allowed a human (me) to touch her for the first time only about five weeks before that picture was taken. I touched her for the first time, the night she had the babies, April 19th, 2000. Dreamer is the gray tabby baby and you will have trouble finding him. This turned out to be the story of his life.

I finally had the tree guards installed. It seems no matter how far he has to jump, Dreamer will jump. Perhaps secretly he flies. I had them install the tree guard as high up as possible before the branches start. This way the cats can get some exercise running up and down the trunk. 

Boy - that tree guard was hard to install. None of us could figure it out. The guys spent over an hour trying to make it work in the heat and flies. Then one of installers threw the directions on the ground and installed it by his own common sense. It works perfectly. 

Dreamer understands he cannot get over the tree guard. I do think he believes if he just thinks about it reeeal hard, he will figure a way to get to the great, wild, out-side-the-fence. 

Now, after almost five months, he seems to think about it less than he did at first. But I did make him a jungle jim out of branches and tree trunks that he leaps around on. It is in the middle of the yard, far away from the fence and the roofs and the tree. Go for it Wander Cat! Sometimes he sits for hours on his highest jungle jim branch and just stares at the tree. But he has failed so many times, he is embarrassed to try again.

************THE DREADED GATE AREA**************

The other thing to be careful of when installing this system, is The Gate area. The treatment around The Gates is important because there is a gap between the gate and the fence. The gap opens as the gate opens; at the opening (O) and at the hinges(H). Kevin realized that the gate bracket and fence post bracket must be level with one another. If your gate opens outward they probably will not be level. Kevin fastened thick wood squares to the gate and attached the bracket to the gate's wood square. That way the bracket on the fence post and the bracket on the gate were level. That and the overlapping mesh eliminated any gap in the netting barrier where the fence and gate meet.

I would also attach a bracket on the actual house and attach netting from that bracket to the first fence post eliminating any gap between the house and the fence.

It is necessary on the last fence post to leave about 3 inches of net overlapping at the hinge opening and from the fence post about 3 inches of net overlapping at the gate opening. we also used hairpin or H clips to hold the brackets together as an extra precaution. 

I will have to remember to take the hairpin clips off when opening the gate every time. What a hassle. My second installer didn't want to overlap the net so he gave me this hassle and the net got ripped when his stupid boss opened the gate from the outside ripping off these clips. These clips are really unnecessary. Use overlapping nets. If the gate and fence post to which it attaches are not level, fasten the gate bracket on a raised wood square to make the fence-post bracket and gate bracket level with one another.

UPDATE*********UPDATE**********UPDATE********

Buy the Gate Hardware Kits for the Combination Barrier System ($30.00 each). I could not figure out why the gate kits were any different than the regular brackets, but my new installer, Kevin, saw at once that the left bracket had the loops for screws going one way and the right bracket had the loops going the other way so that the brackets fit together tightly preventing gate gaps. 


USE SNOW RELEASE CLIPS FOR NET TO BRACKET ATTACHMENT 

AND IF YOU LIVE IN AN AREA WHERE IT SNOWS BE SURE TO BUY THE SNOW RELEASE ATTACHMENT CLIPS and use them.

The second installer insisted on using the twist ties not the snow release clips. Now I am watching the backyard brackets being pulled down and destroyed because of the heavy snow weighing down the nets. These goddamn men who think they know everything and leave you with their mess to clean up long after their gone and who will not follow directions should not be paid until they do what they are told to do or you will regret every dime you give them.

MORE STUPID MAN TRICKS

It is up to the installers to make sure there are no gaps in the Cat Fence-IN system. The first time my installers tried to install the system, my Lemke Fence installers left gaps when they went around the posts. 

They did not take the anchoring strip right up to the edge of the posts and screw the anchor strip down right next to the post; then screw the anchoring strip to the side of the post, and screw down as they went around the post, (side, front, side). Then screw the strip down when the fence boards start again right next to the post. 

No, they screwed the strip about 3 inches from the posts; went over the posts; and screwed it down again two or three inches from the post. Of course, this left gaps in the corners where the post and the fence met. 

And the cats found those gaps. 

They did the same thing when the edge of the north/south fence panels met the fence panels going east and west. They did not keep the anchoring strip's E/W screw close to the N/S screw creating a gap in the corner. 

Don't feel superior. You will do stuff like this if you try to install it yourself. It is only after you actually see the system up, that you understand how it works and how to maintain it.

I recommend watching the cats the first week. Take some vacation time. When Lemke first put the system up, they used the strato barrier and the cats got out. Then, the gates were not done properly, the posts had gaps, and the cats got out.

You need to watch the cats the first week. If anything is wrong you want to catch it. You need to spy on the cats when they think they are alone before you relax. Just be thankful you don't have Mr. and Mrs. Satan from Hell living next door during this process.

You should know that after the tree guard came, all my cats gave up trying to escape pretty quickly. But the best use of the cat fence happened because other cats are always trying to break in and that cat fence keeps them out. 

The intruder cats perch on top of the wooden fence but then cannot figure out how to make it over the top of the cat fence-in netting. There would be big fights if they got in.

I can tell by the way they scream and curse at each other across the netting. A lot of "your mammas". So another good reason to get the cat fence is to keep unwanted cats out of your yard 


BASE FENCE AND THE CAT SYSTEM ARE NOT CHEAP SO YOU HAVE A RIGHT TO EXPECT THE INSTALLERS TO FOLLOW DIRECTIONS

CAT DOORS

There will be the additional cost of the cat doors. Get 4 way lock magnetic ones - do not get those that make you put electric collars on the cats - forget electric anything as far as animals are concerned! They have cheaper pet doors you can put in your window but I would have to put a table out side or the cat could not come back in.

BASE FENCE:

For 102 feet of pressure treated lumber, at $20.00 a foot, (plus 2 gates and locks, posts and cement, and installation), the cost to me was $2,040.00. 

CAT FENCE IN SYSTEM IS INEXPENSIVE - INSTALLATION IS EXPENSIVE

The Cat Fence-IN system (net with anchor strip, bracket holders, screws, net fasteners,= $1.50 a foot; the gate kits = $30.00) is not expensive but Lemke charged a lot to install it (about $700.00). I agreed in order to give them and me the experience. 

Total Costs for; the base fence, the cat fence-in system WITH INSTALLATION came to approximately $2,800.00. The unnecessary tree trimming was an additional $350.00. 

This cost was for a small backyard. 

And to me, it is worth every penny! 

Those people who are comfortable financially really should build cat fences so that the property, when you sell it, will ever after be safe for cats. You will be doing a good thing that will last long after you are gone. Put a metal fence plate telling future owners where to get replacement parts.

The peace of mind, the freedom from terror, the obvious pleasure of the cats as they eat the grass and herbs (helping their digestion and eliminating hairballs by throwing up); watching them roll in the dust, try to catch the bugs, hop on and off the trees, watching them hide and jump out at one another and sleep in the sun; bring me my greatest pleasure in life. 

The cats are so much more active outside than they are in the house.

Now I have the pleasure of working in the garden with my cats lounging next to me again, and being outside at night in the dark watching the silver crescent moon and the stars, giggling together in the strobe light dark. The light is strobed because the yard is filled with hundreds of fireflies and their lights are going on and off. While the cats jump up and swat at fireflies, I hold their flashing bodies in my cupped hands. When I open my hands, they don't fly away but sit calmly on my fingers a while. 

We are losing the weight we gained when we were confined to the house in Dodgeville, not able to step a foot out the door, even Talker, the billion pound cat, who enjoys watching television very much.

Even Dreamer, crazy Dreamer, the traumatized, who was there when Magic was killed, and who was hunted by the killers, has become semi-normal. He has started to be with the pride, tries wrestling with them, licks back a little when his surviving brothers groom him.

The way the brothers have always cared for Dreamer, no matter how unresponsive he was, laying catatonic under their tongues, it touches me and reminds me of how they cared for the dying Sparky as if they could lick away the pain. 

Dreamer is losing his stricken look. He, who, after Magic was killed, never would come near me unless it was to try to sit on my shoulders the way Magic did, and never would sleep with the other cats, now sleeps next to me. Sometimes he stands on his two back legs holding up his front legs with paws on me, obviously wanting to be picked up. When I pick him up he lays horizontal across my chest and wraps his paws around one of my shoulders looking up at me. Yes, we are growing happy again. 

NOTE: 6 months later - Dreamer does not want to leave the yard anymore - will not leave even if given the opportunity. He learned to like being safe in his own outside territory. 

Now there is just Gaia, the golden one, whose hip was dislocated when I found him at the back of my property. Who frequently goes to a place where he is alone, like the basement, and paces back and forth crying loudly. 

I am going to hold him as much as I can, when he does that. 

I feel that is what he needs. I have been letting Thea take care of him, but now I am going to just find him, pick him up, hold him and talk to him when he does that.

NOTE: And it was a very good thing to make that decision, to have enough peace to be able to focus on Gaia and make that decision. Golden Gaia had colitis, which can kill. If you want to read about it, I have made an entry in my blog here.

Here is the link to the cat fence system: www.catfencein.com 

Since 1990 throughout the United States and Canada, CAT FENCE-IN is still keeping thousands of cats safe in their yards. Cat sanctuaries use the CAT FENCE-IN system.

Animal behaviorists recommend CAT FENCE-IN to their clients. It relieves indoor stress, boredom, and depression. It also stops arbitrary in-house elimination problems. Cats are by nature, outdoor animals.

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