The trial of a Massachusetts man charged with torturing a dog so severely that it had to be euthanized started Tuesday with jury selection – but without the expected protests from animal rights advocates.
Radoslaw Czerkawski, 36, faces 11 counts of animal cruelty at his trial in Norfolk County Superior Court in Dedham in a case that drew national attention and sparked calls for tougher penalties for animal abusers.
The year-old pit female bull mix was found cowering in terror in a Quincy park in August 2013 with fractures, a stab wound and a split tongue.
The starving dog that came to be known as Puppy Doe ended up having to be euthanized.
Radoslaw Czerkawski listens to jury selection for his trial on animal cruelty charges at Norfolk Superior Court on Tuesday, March 6 Dedham, Massachusetts
In pain: The dog had suffered such extensive abuse that she had to be put to sleep
Starving dog known as Puppy Doe was found horribly wounded in 2013
Czerkawski has suggested that kids he saw drinking in a park were responsible for the abuse, while a defense attorney previously questioned some of the evidence in the case.
Investigators said they found Puppy Doe’s blood in the second-floor Quincy residence where Czerkawski was living.
The case gripped the local community and animal lovers nationwide ever since the one-year-old dog was found near a play park with signs that she had been beaten, burned, starved and stabbed in the eyes in what was described as ‘medieval’ torture.
Animal rescue workers described the injuries inflicted on the pit bull, including a crude split to give it a forked serpent tongue, as the worst they had ever seen.
She had also been burned on the nose, stabbed in the eye, and beaten so severely that she could barely walk.
Veterinarians at the Animal Rescue League of Boston who treated the dog said that she was emaciated and weighed half of what would be expected for her age.
When she was first found it was thought that she had been hit by a car, but the true nature of her injuries soon came to light.
Czerkawski is accused of abusing a dog so severely that it had to be euthanized
Horrified: Vet Martha Blackmore-Smith says she was heart broken by the extent of the abuse
Cruel: This two-year-old pit bull was found with horrific injuries which many thought at first were caused by being hit by a car
Vet Martha Smith-Blackmore was so shocked by the extent of the abuse that she had to walk away and give herself a break as she examined the dog’s body.
‘Her joints were pulled apart like medieval times,’ she said at the time. ‘She was beaten, stabbed, burned over weeks to months and maybe her whole life. And could not walk.’
The vet added: ‘When I saw how vulnerable she was and I understood immediately the duration of her suffering, my heart collapsed.’
As well as the burn and stab marks, the dog’s vertebrae had been smashed from being hit by a baseball bat or board.
Although there was no evidence of sexual interference, which the vet said can be seen in such abuse cases, the dog’s joints had been separated from being pulled apart repeatedly.
Smith-Blackmore said that the dog’s injuries were so severe she would have been in constant pain for the rest of her life if she hadn’t been put down.
The trial initially was scheduled to start in July, but was delayed by a prosecutor’s emergency eye surgery and Czerkawski’s own health problems.
The case generated massive outrage as it wended through the courts, with Czerkawski standing trial for the two theft cases before facing the animal cruelty charges.
The case drew so much attention that animal rights advocates had promised to hold protests outside court during the trial.