THE SUPREME Court has dismissed a claim by a woman convicted of cruelty to animals that a dog warden was not entitled to seize dogs from buildings at her former home in Co Louth.
After the decision yesterday, Donna Sfar, Oaklands, Dundalk, a barrister who conducted her own proceedings, asked the three-judge court not to award legal costs against her as the case involved “an issue of human rights” which she intends bringing before the European Court of Human Rights. The court said there were no special circumstances to justify departure from the normal rule awarding costs to the winning party.
Ms Sfar argued that the seizure breached her constitutional right to inviolability of her home and the appeal centred on the meaning of the word “dwelling” under the Control of Dogs Act. Ms Sfar argued that a boiler house and open pound from which dogs were seized were part of her dwelling and could only be searched under warrant.
She had not lived at the house at Balriggan in Dundalk which “was my home, my little sanctuary”, since the seizure, she also said.
The court agreed with Pat Butler SC, for Louth County Council, that the places where the animals were seized did not constitute a “dwelling”.
The proceedings are among several actions by Ms Sfar brought after she was convicted of cruelty to animals and fined €6,000 at Dundalk District Court in February 2008 after the court heard some 17 dogs were found living “in absolute filth” with no evidence of food or water for them.
Some of them had open sores and one had maggots, the court was told. The High Court has directed the order preventing Ms Sfar keeping any animals for 10 years should be amended to read “dogs” rather than “animals”.
