AUGUSTA, Maine — Seeking to save a once-violent husky named Dakota from a death sentence, Gov. Paul LePage issued a pardon on Thursday in an effort to spare the newly adopted dog, lining up against a judge’s order and the district attorney.
It was unclear on Thursday whether a Maine governor has ever pardoned an animal, but it’s the biggest legal case on a dog’s fate since 1984, when Tucker the bullmastiff was kidnapped from a cage by advocates after the state’s high court affirmed a ruling condemning him to death.
The governor said in a Thursday statement that he “reviewed the facts of this case and I believe the dog ought to be provided a full and free pardon,” issuing one with his signature.
And while his office said it made the announcement “in an effort to shed light” on Dakota’s plight, Kennebec County District Attorney Maeghan Maloney is reviewing LePage’s authority to issue a pardon here and a law professor said he may have the authority.
LePage’s office said he intervened after the case was brought to his attention by a board member of the Humane Society Waterville Area, which wrote a letter last week to Maloney pleading the dog’s case.
In a Thursday interview, Maloney said that Dakota attacked and killed a neighbor’s dog in 2016 while living with a Winslow man and was ordered by a judge to be confined. Soon after that, she said Dakota broke confinement and attacked a new dog owned by the same neighbor.
That led to Dakota being sentenced to euthanization by District Court Judge Valerie Stanfill on March 21. But before that, the ex-mother-in-law of Dakota’s original owner adopted the dog from the shelter — a move that Maloney said violated a court order that the dog be held there.
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