Washington justices: Animal abuse can be considered domestic violence

The Washington Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously confirmed that animal abuse can constitute domestic violence.

The court issued its ruling in the case of Charmarke Abdi-Issa, a Tukwila man who was convicted of animal abuse with a domestic violence designation for savagely beating his girlfriend’s dog — a Chihuahua-dachshund mix named Mona — to death in a Seattle parking lot in 2018.

He was sentenced to 18 months in prison — 12 for animal abuse and an extra six because the attack traumatized a woman who saw him pounding on the yelping dog and booting it into some bushes.

Responding officers took Mona to a veterinary clinic, where the animal died.

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In Washington, if someone is convicted of first-degree animal cruelty, in a case where one could have tortured and or killed an animal, the maximum time they face is 12 months in jail. Prosecutors say most people serve less than that.

The justices unanimously held that the purpose of the domestic violence designation is to enforce existing criminal statutes in a way that ensures victims are protected. It allows courts to issue a post-conviction no-contact order between the perpetrator and the victim.

While the court unanimously agreed that the domestic violence designation was properly applied in Abdi-Issa’s case, two justices — Debra Stephens and Barbara Madsen — disagreed with the majority’s decision to uphold the extra six months he received for traumatizing a witness.

Stephens and Madsen said that aggravating factor must apply only when a crime has a destructive and foreseeable impact on a specific person or group of people besides the victim — not simply because the crime is committed in public and a witness is traumatized.

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