There's supposed to be a connection between animal cruelty and violence to humans, and there's a pretty sick case of that in Queens. Based on a complaint, the ASPCA went to the Queens Health Care Facility in Rockaway to ask security guard Dustin Gill about a girlfriend's dog. But the ASPCA agents found much more. From the NY Sun:
An ASPCA special agent, Richard Ryan, was investigating a complaint phoned into the agency's hotline on December 11 that Mr. Gill had taken a dog and killed it. When the agent arrived at the guard shack to question Mr. Gill on Sunday, the guard answered the door wearing no shirt and with his pants undone, sources said. Inside, Mr. Ryan found the girl in a bathroom, wearing nothing.
Mr. Gill told Mr. Ryan that the girl was his girlfriend, but an arrest was made at the scene. ASPCA agents, who are often former police officers, are empowered to carry weapons and to make arrests.
The girl, who Gill called his girlfriend, was 14 and had called the ASPCA because Gill had given her a pit bull puppy but then taken it away. The Daily News reports ASPCA Joseph Pentangelo as saying, "According to the victim, the suspect had been intimate with her several times since September 2005."
The dog has not been found. Gill was charged with rape, child welfare endangerment and sexual abuse.
