Today while listening to CFRA, I heard that the Humane Society is warning about the dangers of leaving pets in cars during the heat of summer. Great. No objection here.
They also said that they have received over 100 complaints so far of people leaving pets in cars this summer season. Wonderful. I am glad people are observant and willing to make a call to help save a family pet.
Then they said that anyone caught leaving their pet in a car with the heat going will be charged. And they even said fines can range from $500 to 2 years in jail.
The agency maintains that if a pet must be rescued from a locked, hot car, charges will be laid against the owner.
Penalties can range up to $500 and a maximum of two years in jail.
The operative word above is “will”. They WILL be charged. Pretty definitive word.
Everything seems hunky dorey to me.
But wait. Did we not just have a case in Ottawa of a couple who left their month old baby in the back seat of a car on a 30 degree Celsius day while they shopped in an air conditioned Home Depot for an hour? And did that couple NOT get charged?
Yup. This most certainly did happen.
Even though they could under the Criminal Code, Ottawa police, unbelievably, are not charging a couple with the stunningly irresponsible act of leaving their infant alone in a vehicle Saturday for almost an hour in a humid, sweltering temperature of 30C while they were shopping at an air-conditioned Home Depot.
How the hell could they not have known better?
Not that first-time parents is any excuse, but they aren’t. They have several children.
How the hell can they not be charged by the police, one of whom saw the infant in the vehicle, broke the window, after which the infant was rushed to hospital by paramedics, and — luckily — found to be in stable condition.
The 30C temperature was outside.
God knows what it was inside the closed-windows vehicle.
The child had no say in the matter.
It was only a month old.
A human being.
This is simply OfficiallyScrewed. This comparison of the way two similar situations are treated with the only difference being the animal is treated like a human and the human is treated like an animal. It sure says something about how “humane” our society really is.