Greene determined they “had a drive to fight” during the evaluation.
TYLER, Texas — “Her words were they don’t know how to be dogs,” Smith County Animal Control Supervisor Amber Greene.
Smith County Animal Control hired a behavioral specialist from Jacksonville, Florida to evaluate the 28 game-bred pit bulls from the alleged dog fighting bust last month.
Sixty-nine dogs and two cats were rescued from what officials believe was a dog fighting facility in Tyler.
“How the dogs interacted with the different people here, and how they interacted with each other, and if it was a male or female, some of them were very shy, not aggressive but very shy,” Greene said.
Out of the 38, 27 were not aggressive. Greene says those dogs will be sent to out-of-state rescues to be rehabilitated and eventually adopted. She plans to start reaching out those rescues over the next week.
“We can change their mind set of being scared of another dog, it gives them the change to be in a home environment and we want to give them that,” Greene said.
As for the 11 other dogs, they were aggressive to other animals and people.
Greene determined they “had a drive to fight” during the evaluation. Those dogs will be euthanized.
This comes after the specialist says she doesn’t recommend they be put into a home environment. There’s no time frame for when this will happen.
On the other hand, six of those dogs were in critical condition and sent to Spence and White veterinary clinic, where Dr. Spence says they were used as fighting bait dogs and for breeding. They've made a lot of progress since the beginning on their stay.
“They’re all doing wonderful,” Dr. Gary Spence said.
Dr. Spence says all six dogs are fully vetted after they suffered severe injuries, heart worms, hook worms, and more and they’re ready for adoption through Nicholas Pet Haven.
“They've been thrilled to get out of the situation they were in and be treated like little human beings,” Spence said.
RELATED: Fernando Valenzuela, Mexican-born pitcher whose feats for Dodgers fueled ‘Fernandomania,' dies at 63
CBS19 is available live and on-demand on your favorite TV streaming device, anytime from anywhere in the U.S.
The free CBS19+ app for Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV and smart TV devices features a 24/7 stream with the latest from CBS19.
In addition to the live stream, watch the latest from CBS19 on-demand, along with additional programming from our partners at TEGNA (like Verify, “Murder at My Door” and “In the News”) and Locked On Sports, plus special collections from CBS19 like Under the Lights, Hooked on East Texas and CBS19 Originals.
Add the free CBS19 channel by searching for CBS19 East Texas News in the Roku Channel Store on your device, or add the CBS19+ Roku channel using this link.
Search for the free CBS19+ app in the Amazon App Store directly on your Fire TV or Fire TV Stick, or add the CBS19+ Fire TV app using this link.
Learn more about the free CBS19+ app in the Apple TV App Store and download directly from your Apple TV device.
DOWNLOAD ON YOUR SMART TV
The CBS19+ app is also now available directly on “smart” or “connected” televisions made by Samsung, LG and Philips, as well as televisions with Android TV. Search for CBS19 East Texas News in your television's app store to add CBS19+.
The CBS19+ 24/7 stream can be viewed on any desktop or mobile web browser anytime on the Watch page here on cbs19.tv.
