A police officer will not face prosecution, after a judge ruled that he had no way of knowing that the dog in his charge was dangerous and unpredictable.
We first wrote about this case in February 2018.
PC Paul Youll, pictured above with a different dog, was due to stand trial last week after denying an offence under section 3(1) of the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991, namely that he was in charge of a dog dangerously out of control near to Ormesby Stables, Ormesby Hall on the evening of 6th June 2016 and whilst out of control that dog caused injury to another person. The offence carries a maximum sentence of 5 years imprisonment.
He was the handler of Police Dog Ilko, which was being exercised in the area of Ormesby Hall when it took off and bit elite Teesside athlete Jonny Taylor. To make matters worse, the incident happened only a few weeks before Mr Taylor was due to take part in trials for the Olympics.
At the conclusion of a two day abuse of process hearing Judge Stephen Earl, a former District Judge (Magistrates' Court), ruled that the trial of PC Youll should not go ahead.
Judge Earl, sitting at Newcastle Crown Court at the city's Moot Hall, said it would be an "affront to the justice system" if PC Youll was prosecuted after a string of failures by both his force, Cleveland Police, and the force that previously owned Ilko, West Mercia Police.
Back in 2011, when Ilko was licensed for operational use by West Mercia, the animal carried out a vicious attack on a police observer.
Ilko's licence was revoked and West Mercia, despite acknowledging that the animal was unfit for general duties police work, formulated a plan to sell him off to another police force and thus recover some of his cost.
West Mercia emails revealed the outcome of a risk assessment on Ilko: "If things went wrong again, there would be no backing from the force, especially in the current climate."
The assessment concluded the dog was "unpredictable in nature and does pose a risk when deployed in certain operational roles".
It said: "The dog has shown it can bite without provocation. It would not be appropriate to offer a licence for this dog."
Ilko was sold to Cleveland at the knock down price of £1,200 only three days after West Mercia revoked the dog's licence.
Selvaraju Ramasamy, counsel for PC Youll, told the judge: "In 2011, PC Youll meets Ilko, because Cleveland Police buys the dog from West Mercia Police.
"They bought the dog for £1,200, which is interesting as West Mercia were after £1,800 to £2,000, so somehow the price has come down, one wonders why that is?"
Cleveland Police Superintendent Bev Gill signed off the purchase of Ilko.
The dog was immediately put into general purpose training and then given a licence in that December, something an expert witness claimed should never have happened.
In her evidence to an Independent Office for Police Conduct enquiry, Supt Gill confirmed that she knew the dog had previously bitten someone she believed was its handler, but had never been made aware of the full circumstances by West Mercia.
PC Youll had been assigned Ilko as a replacement for his previous dog, but was not made aware of the animal's chequered history.
Addressing the judge, Mr Ramasamy said: "We submit this dog was a ticking time bomb and should never have been licensed, of course, it was. This is not the fault of PC Youll but the fault of the state collectively."
He added that PC Youll would have taken steps to mitigate the risks, had he known about Ilko's aggressive past.
In his judgement, Judge Earl said: "I am satisfied that an abuse of the court's process does exist.
"The state owned the dog throughout and had all of the information but it was not shared."
He added the dog's character and behaviour were not shared with PC Youll and that the "state placed him in that position" and that he was at a "distinct disadvantage."
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