I don't understand why an easy fix wasn't used: a muzzle. Especially after getting cited for previous incidents. If those dogs were muzzled each time they were taken outside their own apartment, they would not have been a menace; they might knock someone down but they could even bite, much less kill.

I think the police department and the city should also be cited- wherever I have lived, a citation carries penalties for non-compliance.

When my daughter was four, playing in my brother's back yard, she was bitten by a collie that the owners were required to keep chained or in its own back yard under penalty of being destroyed. That evening, the father and son came over to see her stitches- they went home and shot the dog themselves.

The whole thing was a sad business. Here I was, - a dog lover- there was my daughter- traumatized and in pain and in danger of fearing dogs forever after (She doesn't), the neighbors lost their pet...

I don't see the murder verdict as being able to stand an appeal- but malicious mischief and gross negligence- oh, yes.

Ebbie