Long-time Lawa‘i resident Melvin Dickens was sentenced to eight months in jail Thursday after an earlier conviction in District Court for animal cruelty. Dickens, 61, was given a 30-day stay, until September 12, so that he can appeal his conviction,
Long-time Lawa‘i resident Melvin Dickens was sentenced to eight months in jail Thursday after an earlier conviction in District Court for animal cruelty.
Dickens, 61, was given a 30-day stay, until September 12, so that he can appeal his conviction, which stemmed from hitting a dog until it went unconscious. And his friend and public defender said that they will.
“I’m not through yet,” said Melissa Willis, a friend of Dickens who is helping him run his beekeeping business. “If everything was done right, he wouldn’t be (facing) jail. I want him to be exonerated.”
If Dickens does appeal, he will stay out of jail until a decision is made, said his lawyer, Deputy Public Defender Erick Moon. The appeals process can take years.
But Kevin Millett, the owner of the dog, who is named Chili, said he hopes Dickens instead will be in Kaua‘i Community Correctional Center in September. Millett says his dog is nearly blind, and his daughter, Ayla, now 11 and one of a bunch of children who witnessed the beating, is still traumatized by the November, 2003 incident.
“We’re shook up, but we’re pretty glad he’s going to jail,” Millett said Friday in a phone interview. “Hats off to the judge. I had zero hope in the system.”
“He went too far,” said Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Dena Renti Cruz. She added that she also asked for Dickens to pay restitution for the dog’s hospital bills, but District Court Judge Trudy Senda did not order it, based on lack of financial ability to pay it back.
“He has a history of crimes against people. This is not his first violent crime,” Renti Cruz said. “He’s not a meek, mild man.”
But Moon said that it was Judge Senda who went too far.
“The sentence was a little excessive for beating a dog when the dog entered into his property. He tried to chase the dogs out (of his sister’s yard) and the dog turned on Melvin,” said Moon. “The dog is still alive.”
Moon said that he will be planning an appeal based on the facts of the case.
“Common sense would believe you would have a right to protect your property,” Moon added. “If a person entered your property, you would have the right to defend yourself. Why not with a dog?”
“Who’s to say how you’re going to act when faced with a growling dog?” Moon added.
But Millett said that the dog, a medium-sized Labrador mix, “had the fight beat out of her” a long time ago. The Milletts found Chili wandering in Lawa‘i five years ago, bloodied and beaten.
“She’s the meekest, most easily frightened; she’s anything but intimidating,” said Millett. “He broke her face all up. It took months for her to breathe through her nose again. She’s going to have a shortened life.”
“Who could have ever done such a horrible thing to an innocent kid and a very sweet dog?” Marcie Millett, Kevin’s wife, said in an e-mail.
Willis contends that Dickens is harmless and misunderstood.
“They make him look like an old, mean man,” Willis said in a phone interview. “I work with him. He is not.”
Willis added that she has compiled 20 signatures of customers and friends to support Dickens and his kind nature.
But the prosecutor cites Dickens’ criminal record, and the severity of the beating, as proof that the November, 2003, incident was not isolated.
According to Renti Cruz, Dickens has prior convictions for assault, second-degree terroristic threatening, disorderly conduct, harassment, as well as a felony conviction for growing marijuana plants (first-degree promotion of detrimental drug), Renti Cruz said.
He is currently on probation on the felony drug charge, and Renti Cruz said she “would not rule out” additional jail time for a probation violation, pending further investigation.
And, according to Kevin Millett, who arrived on the scene just after the incident, the beating was unprovoked.
“I rounded the corner (of Hailima Street) to see my 11-year-old daughter screaming at the top of her lungs, ripping at her hair with both hands and wracked by full body shakes,” Millett said in an e-mail.
“On the ground in front of her was Chili, unable to move and covered with blood. Blood was oozing out of both her eyes, both of her ears and drooling out of her mouth. Her back had several fist size lumps already visibly rising. I immediately assumed that she was dead. At the scene were at least eight children from the neighborhood, along with several adults who had come out because of the noise,” he said.
Millett added, “My daughter (Ayla) had been walking our two dogs with her friends and the neighbor kids keeping company. Both dogs were on leashes.”
“The dogs broke free from the kids and began chasing the chickens into and around the yard. My daughter gave chase to the dogs and was trying to round them up,” when the beating began, he said.
Ayla “begged him to let her get them out. (My other dog) ran out of the yard before Dickens could catch him, but Chili panicked herself into a corner and began to blindly try clawing through the fence to get away,” he said.
But Dickens, whose ex-wife was twice bitten severely by a dog, has said repeatedly that he was defending himself and only hit Chili two or three times.
“Mr. Dickens felt he was protecting his property and self,” his lawyer, Moon, said.
But the prosecutor said that two witnesses testified that Dickens could have acted differently. They also testified he threw the unconscious dog into the street, and ignored pleas to stop.
“The dog’s back was to Dickens when he started beating her up,” Ayla and another adult witness testified, said Renti Cruz.
The Milletts wound up moving to Kalaheo, because it was “pretty hard to drive by the house and stare him down,” said Millett. “Basically I was going to attack him.”
And other neighbors have said it’s not the first time people have moved from the neighborhood because of Dickens. But Willis, who lives with Dickens and her husband in the Hailima Street home, said he does what he can with what he’s been given.
Dickens, who suffered serious head trauma in a childhood accident and cannot read or write, makes a living through the “nature schooling” he’s been given, said Willis.
“I’ve talked to a lot of people on his behalf,” said Willis. “He wouldn’t hurt a fly unless he had to.”
Dickens raises the bees for honey, which is a large part of his income.
“He’s making an honest living with the trade he’s been taught,” said Willis.
“I try to be straight and honest,” said Dickens. “You gotta defend yourself. What’s more important, a dog or a human?”
Dr. Rebecca Rhoades, executive director of the Kaua‘i Humane Society, said that violence against animals cannot be as easily tossed aside.
“There’s very strong documented connection between violence against animals and violence against people,” said Rhoades. “Action needs to be taken.
“If anyone is concerned about the mistreatment of any animal, they should report to us or” the police department, the veterinarian said. Callers to the humane society can remain anonymous, although it makes it harder to prove a case, she said.
Ayla’s mother concurred.
“There is hope in the justice system and a fair judge in our county court who has come to the animal’s defense,” Marcie Millett wrote.
But Willis says Judge Senda might have not been fair to Dickens, as Senda was formerly on the Board of Directors of Kaua‘i Humane Society.
Renti Cruz completely disagreed.
“I think she’s a fair judge,” she said. “He testified on his own behalf, called witnesses, and she made a decision.” Plus Moon did not ask Senda to recuse herself.
“I thought she would be fair, because everyone knew she was on the Board,” Moon said, adding that she had denied motions to recuse on other animal cruelty cases.
Tom Finnegan, staff writer, can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 226) or by e-mail at tfinnegan@pulitzer.net
