3 teens arrested after viral video surfaces of child abusing his duck dog

Three Louisiana teenagers were arrested Saturday on animal cruelty charges after local police became aware of a Snapchat video that showed a suspect brutally abusing his Labrador retriever. The graphic footage was recorded in early 2023 during a duck hunt by a second suspect while the third watched off-camera, the Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff’s Office said.

The incident occurred between hauling the fish in waist-deep water at or near the Manchac WMA on Lake Pontchartrain. Footage shows the owner ignoring all dog training and behavior standards as the confused Labrador tries to do as he is told. The owner yells and curses at his dog, calls him the n-word, gives commands the dog does not understand, chokes him by his collar, repeatedly shocks him with an e-collar, and brutally hits the dog in the ear over and over again as the dog howls in pain. Two other teens can be heard laughing and screaming off-camera.

The video is incredibly difficult to watch, and viewers are advised to exercise caution if they come across it (several posts containing the footage have already been removed from social media platforms including Facebook). It’s unclear how the disturbing video began circulating, but the Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff’s Office received about a dozen calls from an outraged public on Saturday, said Ashely Rodrigue, the sheriff’s office’s public information officer. That led to an investigation by agency detectives and the arrest that same day of three juveniles from the Ponchatoula area.

“When we went to make the arrest on Saturday, we certainly took the opportunity to assess the dog we had in our hands. told was the same dog,” says Rodrigue Outdoor living, noting that a year and a half has passed since the incident. “The animal we received … was assessed and found to be healthy … with a good disposition.”

Despite 91,000 signatures (and counting) on ​​a recent petition for the permanent removal of the Lab While the teen has legal custody, decisions regarding the dog’s home do not currently fall under the jurisdiction of the Sheriff’s Office. The only thing Rodrigue could reveal about the Lab’s current whereabouts is that “the dog is not in the presence of any of the three suspects.” Details about the Lab’s age, sex, and name are not available, though photos circulating online show it to be a chocolate Lab.

“We continue to be in discussions with several other organizations and agencies in case there is an opportunity to take additional action,” she said, citing legal experts, animal welfare agencies and animal control. “It’s horrific. We are as outraged as the public. Our swift actions to make arrests in this case this past weekend are a testament to our commitment to justice in this case, and that this investigation is not over. We hope the public can trust that we will handle this case appropriately and not take any action into our own hands.”

The teen who hit his dog was charged with one count of animal cruelty, while the two who laughed and booed from behind the camera were each charged with one count of first-degree animal cruelty. The investigation is ongoing, Rodrigue said, noting that some details about the case are limited because the three suspects are all 15 years old. She could not comment on whether the three boys are still in custody or what possible legal action or punishments might follow. She did confirm that the sheriff’s office has also reached out to the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries for the investigation.

A problem for all of us

The most pressing concern in this video is the welfare of the dog. The public is rightly concerned about the abuse they saw on camera and the abuse that continues (or could continue) off camera. The long-term concern is the aftermath for honest, ethical duck hunters and their dogs.

Any hunting dog owner will tell you how much time, effort and money they spend keeping their hunting dog safe, healthy and happy. But because this child looks like as a duck hunter—he’s wearing waders, he’s out on the marsh with his buddies, and they’ve shot a few ducks—his actions will shape public opinion of hunters in general. Three dumb teenagers have made a video that will absolutely be weaponized against hunters and the hunting community. For all 51 terrifying seconds of the clip, the potential for our destruction crackles like lightning in a dry season.

The animal abuse is the most obvious and the thing that will make headlines. It’s the kind of behavior that animal rights activists imagine when they think of hunters and it’s what they’ll seize upon when they inevitably get their hands on this video. As if the physical abuse of the Lab wasn’t bad enough, there’s an eerie pleasure in the Louisiana kid’s rage.

“I’m gonna fuck you,” the boy says as he fumbles for his e-collar remote. “I hope this shit burns.”

Then there’s the racism. While rare, this wasn’t the first time I’ve heard a duck hunter call his brown or black dog the n-word. I hope it’s the last. The sheer anger and subsequent violence that follows its use in this video should make it clear why many hunters of color fear for their safety at the boat ramp or in the woods. When a new hunter or non-hunter sees this video, it will reinforce the stereotype that hunters are racist, backward rednecks and further the divide between urban and rural communities.

Woven into all of this is the perversion of e-collars and dog training, two topics that have been a source of fierce infighting within the hunting community and have now become mainstreamed among the wider dog-owning public. This video shows what animal welfare activists think discipline and e-collar use seems to be common within the hunting community when it couldn’t be further from the truth. I’ve written before about the staggering amount of work, patience, and sacrifice that goes into training a hunting dog. I’ve interviewed and worked with a dozen dog trainers of as many styles; their one unifying philosophy is to keep their wits about them when training and interacting with a dog. To train a hunting dog of any skill level, you must be willing to train yourself and understand that any fault in your dog likely originates with you.

Anyone who has experience with dogs can see that the chocolate Labrador in this video is confused and terrified—he’s not being misbehaving or stubborn. Worse, the video illustrates the exact opposite of the bond that all true duck hunters have with their dogs. The first duty of any hunter in the field is the safety of his companions, and that always includes the dog. This teenager may be wearing camouflage and killing ducks, but the fact that he and his friends have no idea that such a bond is supposed to exist tells me what the public may never understand about this incident: These kids are not duck hunters.

What real hunters can do

If there’s one lesson the hunting community learned when the Wyoming wolf torture incident hit the news this spring, it’s that we didn’t distance ourselves quickly enough from an animal abuser who called himself a hunter. There are many parallels between Cody Roberts — the man who ran over a young wolf on a snowmobile and paraded the wounded animal around a country bar — and this Louisiana boy who tortured his dog.

But leaving threatening comments on social media isn’t the answer. The animal abuse depicted in this video has led social media users to post the names, photos, and home addresses of the minors online. What started as a legitimate goal (to identify perpetrators of a crime) has escalated to threats of violence against both the children in the video and well-meaning hunters who shared the video to raise awareness.

After outfitter and waterfowl hunter Dustin Colvard initially shared a video of the incident in hopes of bringing the children to justice, the duck hunting community began attacking them it for what they thought was a video of him hitting his own dog. To make it clear: Colvard is not in the video and does not know the child in it. He simply shared the video in the hopes that the children would be found and charged with a crime.

He did not respond to a request for comment for this story Monday, but wrote in a Facebook post that he had “received threats” Monday night posted on Facebook to say he no longer wanted to engage with the hunting community about the dog abuse video.

“I am being accused of things I never did, and my name should never have been brought up,” Colvard wrote. “Don’t ask me for the video. I will no longer be involved in this case. I have tried to do something good in this community by raising awareness. It has the potential to change my life. [hunting] brand in danger that I have worked so hard to build. It is just becoming too dangerous for me and my family and it is simply unbelievable that some people cannot read. I understand that most of these people are just talking but that does not matter. The safety of my family [sic] is what matters most.”

Many of those threats came from adults, including adult hunters. One notable difference between the Wyoming wolf video and this one is that the three children in the video are just that: 15-year-olds. At the time the video was filmed, the boys were at least 14, possibly as young as 13. While that doesn’t excuse their behavior (no child I know or have hunted with would do such a thing), it is telling. It begs the question that many social media commentators have already asked: Where was this child’s father?

It is irresponsible to speculate about the details of a troubled child’s home life, not least because he is a minor and we do not have (and will not have) the facts. But one thing is clear: these children have never had the benefit of thoughtful duck hunting mentors. If they had, this incident would never have happened.

Read more: Australia’s response to duck hunting isn’t as far off as Americans think

As in any community, there has always been, and will always be, a small population of jerks and rebellious teenagers in the darkest corners of the duck hunting community. Often, the two overlap. There seems to be a tendency these days among seasoned hunters to either write off this next generation (“These kids don’t get it”) or make excuses for their behavior (“Hey, we did all kinds of crazy stuff when we were kids”). But neither perspective is helpful.

It’s up to experienced duck hunters to do the hard work of turning those rule-breaking teens into decent hunters, while also weeding out the most reprehensible among us — like the kids in this video. This effort takes time, patience, and care. It needs to happen in the field, not on social media. And if we fail, the prize could be the future of duck hunting.