Wayne County Men Charged, Nine Dogs Dead
By: Caroline Tucker
Updated: February 1, 2013
Two Wayne County men are expected to appear in Town of Galen Court this month to face animal cruelty charges.
Along Burch Road, you will find just one farm that belongs to Merlin Schmucker, 26.
There are at least 2 dogs on the property now, but New York State Police said he asked a cousin, who was also an employee, to kill puppies that he couldn't sell.
In his statement to police, Schmucker said: "I had tried to sell them for awhile and then they got too big. I...I had raised them and couldn't put them down muself so I asked Jonathan to do it. He said they would be gone when I got home and I wouldn't see anything of them again."
"It was not a justifiable killing and as a result they had no right to do that," said Richard Healy, Wayne County District Attorney.
Nine Australian Red Heelers were killed.
In a statement to State Police, Jonathan Eicher, 19, said he used a .22 rifle to shoot the dogs.
The Wayne County District Attorney said the town's DPW noticed the dogs lying in a ditch along this road.
But by the time State Police came to investigate, the dogs had been moved.
State Police found the dogs in a compost pile behind the home.
The men are both Amish and now face animal cruelty charges.
"They didn't know that it was illegal to do that," said Healy.
In Eicher's statement to police he said: " I didn't beat or torture the dogs. They didn't suffer....In the Amish it's accepted to put animals down, I wasn't aware it was criminal to put the dogs down."
The Wayne County DA said that doesn't make it legal.
"The fact that they were healthy young dogs, you just can't kill animals like that, you can't do that, there is no reason for it," said Healy.
Eicher and schmucker both are expected to appear in Town of Galen Court on February 20.
