PLAIN TWP. ‒ The sun would set early — just before 5 p.m. — on Dec. 17, when Gary C. Hudson and his father Gary L. Hudson decided to go fishing.
So they headed to a small lake off Aspen Street NE, about three miles from their home, abandoning their initial plan to go to Walborn Reservoir near Alliance, a more distant destination that would leave them less time at the water.
The son already had changed plans for the afternoon, having first considered going to a shooting range. He was openly carrying a 9mm gun on his chest.
That series of decisions put both men in a van on Middlebranch Avenue NE when a Plain Local Schools bus dropped off two children, 11-year-old Shy’la Allen and her 6-year-old sister Zhavia Allen-Poole, near their home.
Shy’la was greeted by the family pet, a 55-pound dog named Rocko, a mix between an American pit bull terrier and a Patterdale terrier.
The interaction that day between the Hudsons, the girls from the bus and their pet led to the younger Hudson pulling his weapon, fatally shooting the dog and later facing a criminal charge for his actions.
After Gary C. Hudson, 27, was acquitted by a jury, the Hudsons agreed to share their side of the story with the Canton Repository.
‘That dog’s attacking that girl.’
A female motorist driving by told a deputy sheriff that she saw the girl crying, left her car, went over to the girl and got her away from the dog. She said the dog had been jumping on the girl.
The Hudsons watched the scene unfold.
“That adult, I could see that she was struggling to get this dog off of this child,” Gary C. Hudson said.
“He hollered in my ear. He said, ‘Dad, pull over. That dog’s attacking that girl,'” his father recalled.
“There was no other adult attempting to help,” Gary C. Hudson said. “Whenever I noticed that, I wanted to got out of the car. And I wanted to check and see if maybe me and her could come together in an effort to try to de-escalate the situation.
“This wasn’t a playful greeting because it persisted for a period of time … especially coupled with the fact that this child was visibly in distress and was panicked about this dog’s behavior that day,” Gary C. Hudson said. He heard the girl scream. “I believed that she was going to be attacked. I believed, getting out of the car, that she was under attack.”
He recalled asking the woman who had stopped to help, “Hey, is that your dog?”
“After that inquiry to the woman … (the dog) immediately turned aggressive and came to attack me,” the younger Hudson said.
That’s when he fatally shot the dog.
Father and son felt shooting dog was their duty
Both men say the son’s actions on Dec. 17 were necessary.
A jury found Gary C. Hudson not guilty of cruelty to companion animals on June 17.
“The dog was not restrained that day; it was running loose,” said Gary L. Hudson. “We wanted to go fishing that day. Let’s say we drive by that day and go fishing. And we read the story in the next two or three days in the paper that that little girl got disfigured in the face.”
“What kind of people are me and my son, that drove by and didn’t care? It was our duty to pull over and see if we could assist.”
The father noted that dogs bite about 17,000 Ohioans every year.
As the owner of a 70-pound pit bull named Rocky, Gary C. Hudson said, “I’m well aware of the danger that they can cause. I’m a father, I have a 7-year-old daughter.”
Both men say they were reacting to what they believed was a dangerous situation.
“Who in their right mind would just put on a gun and say, ‘Hey Dad, let’s go kill a dog.’ I mean that was the furthest thing from our mind, until we saw the dog jumping up at the girl,” Gary L. Hudson said.
The son cited the statement the girl, Shy’la Allen, made to a Stark County sheriff’s deputy after the incident. The report said the girl told him that the dog attacked her after she tried to get it out of the road, fearing that it would be hit by a passing vehicle.
Gary C. Hudson said he believes emotion played a role in the filing of the criminal charge that resulted in him spending four days in jail, including Christmas Day.
He said the situation that led to his arrest and criminal charge could have been prevented if the dog had been confined or leashed.
Witness accounts of the incidents varied. One neighbor wrote that the girl was screaming because the dog was jumping on her. She wrote that the dog would not stop jumping on the woman who stopped to help the girl, and was shielding her from the dog. She wrote that she did not see the dog charge at the man who shot it.
Owner of shot dog disagreed with verdict
April Allen, the woman whose dog was killed, expressed displeasure with the outcome of the criminal case.
“Justice was not served,” she told The Repository after Hudson was found not guilty.
“We are not happy about it. It was devastating to see that my daughter had to go back and see him again and to know that nothing, no justice for her dog would be served. And she felt like, you know, he just got away with … murder.”
Even though he was cleared by a jury, the younger Hudson said he suffered the consequences of being charged.
He spent two months on house arrest. He got permission to leave home to work in his father’s antique business but was confined to home on evenings and weekends. His guns were seized as a term of his bond. He faced the possibility of a minimum of three years in prison if convicted.
“I wasn’t looking forward to having to use my firearm and face legal difficulties but I felt like I had no other option. I was a father acting on instinct. I felt that it was my civil and moral duty to attempt to ensure the safety of that child.”
Reach Nancy at 330-580-8382 or nancy.molnar@cantonrep.com.
This article originally appeared on The Repository: ‘That dog’s attacking that girl.’ Man who fatally shot Plain Township canine explains why
Reporting by Nancy Molnar, Canton Repository / The Repository
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