Special to The Legal Animal. Malvin Cavalier has filed suit in Pennsylvania for the return of his beloved poodle, Bandit.
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Photo: Malvin Cavalier and his grandson pose with Bandit during happier times. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In the past few years, 86-year-old Malvin Cavalier has lost his wife, his home, and the community where he has spent a lifetime.
Now, his dearest wish is to see his dog, Bandit, again.
“I had Bandit over 10 years. Bandit and I were so close together, and after my wife died in 2003 we got closer together, I didn’t have nobody else,” Cavalier says. “I really just want Bandit back before I leave this earth. I ask almighty God, I pray hard for it every night.”
The last time Cavalier saw Bandit, a miniature poodle mix, was right before Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans. Making a last-minute decision to evacuate to the Superdome, Cavalier left Bandit in their 9th-Ward home with big buckets of dry food and water, and a door ajar in case the dog needed to leave the house.
Weeks later, Bandit was rescued from the New Orleans floodwaters about a mile from Cavalier’s home. Cavalier has now filed a lawsuit to reclaim Bandit from Lisa Fox, a woman in Pennsylvania who has reportedly adopted the dog.
Agonizing decision to leave Bandit behind. Cavalier struggled with the decision to evacuate without Bandit.
“I felt bad, real bad,” Cavalier says about leaving his dog behind. “They weren’t taking animals at the Superdome, other than that, I would have taken Bandit anywhere, but I wasn’t going to leave him on the street.”
Cavalier says Bandit slept inside with him, and rarely went outside except to go to the bathroom, or help Cavalier do yard work. In fact, he says, he and his dog were almost never apart.
Cavalier and his dog talked frequently, and Cavalier vividly recalls his last conversation with Bandit: “I patted him on the head, and said, ‘Well, Bandit, I can’t take you to the Superdome, because they already broadcast, don’t bring any animals to the Superdome, only human beings. You just hole up here, you’ve got plenty of food – a whole bucket of food that will last a week. I’ll see you in a couple of days when this storm has passed over.’”
But Cavalier didn’t return in a few days. After six terrifying days in the Superdome that he was lucky to survive, he was bused to Dallas, Texas, where he was housed with a group of evacuees in an old jail. Now, he lives in Houston, while he waits for a FEMA trailer to be placed in his yard so he can finally go back home.
Like most New Orleans residents, Cavalier never dreamed that the levees would break, leaving his raised house with five feet of water. He never dreamed that it would be many weeks before authorities would even allow him to visit his neighborhood. And he never dreamed that his dog would end up in Pennsylvania, with a new owner who refuses to return him.
“Bandit is a special dog to me in my life, and why would she try to keep me from enjoying my dog? I wouldn’t do that to her, no way, I’m not that type of man,” he says.
Photo: Bandit is pictured at the Lamar-Dixon temporary shelter in September, 2005. Bandit's journey. Since Bandit was rescued, the dog has also had a long and complicated journey.
At first, he was taken to for a few days to the Lamar-Dixon staging area in Gonzales, Louisiana, operated by the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS). On September 25, Bandit’s picture was posted on Petfinder, along with rabies tag numbers that definitively identified him as Mr. Cavalier’s dog.
According to Cavalier’s lawsuit, paperwork shows that Bandit was taken from Lamar-Dixon by Peter McKosky, a representative of the Chenoa Manor Animal Shelter, and transported to Pennsylvania in late September along with a number of other animals.
In order to take Bandit, McKosky signed agreements with HSUS promising that Bandit would be held at Chenoa Manor until September 30, after which time he could be placed in a foster home. However, under the agreement, the foster home was required to hold the dog until October 15, and return the animal to his owner if claimed before that date. (See tomorrow’s story from The Legal Animal examining the legality of these agreements)
Malvin Cavalier’s son, Marcus, located Bandit’s picture on Petfinder on October 13, and contacted Chenoa Manor requesting his return. He was later told by phone that the dog had never been kept at Chenoa Manor and had been retained by McKosky, the complaint says.
According to the lawsuit, McKosky refused to return Bandit, suggesting that Malvin Cavalier had been irresponsible in “abandoning” the dog, and therefore did not deserve him back. The complaint alleges that McKosky later transferred the dog to Voices for Animals, an animal rights association in Pennsylvania, which subsequently allowed Fox to adopt the dog.
Cavalier aided in lawsuit. After failed attempts at negotiating for Bandit’s return, Cavalier filed a “complaint in replevin” against Fox, an equitable action seeking the return of Bandit, rather than monetary damages.
Cavalier’s efforts to reclaim Bandit have been aided all along by members of a grassroots group known as the Stealth Volunteers, which specializes in helping to reunite lost Katrina pets with their owners.
Stealth volunteer Sandra Bauer, a resident of Canada, has been trying to aid Cavalier throughout his struggle to reclaim Bandit.
Bauer says that through her work with Stealth she has talked to many owners whose stories have touched her deeply, but that she was particularly moved by the story of Cavalier and Bandit.
“This is a man who had his best friend taken away from him for reasons not of his own choosing, and it seemed like such a simple thing to bring back a little happiness in his life. After everything he’d been through and all he had lost, it seemed like such a simple thing to return his dog – it is incomprehensible that it could be so difficult,” she says.
Cavalier and his representatives have never been able to speak to Fox directly about returning the dog, and have not even been able to locate her to serve her with the lawsuit. In fact, they are still searching for hints to the whereabouts of Fox and Bandit.
Fox is being represented by Pittsburgh attorney Carolyn Flamm, who says she has a policy of not discussing active cases and would not comment on whether her client was willing to return Bandit.
“All I can say is that we were at the point of amicably resolving this case, and the interference of the Stealth Volunteers has been counterproductive to the resolution of this case,” she says, declining to be more specific about what she means by “interference.”
Flamm says she was in the midst of trying to schedule a settlement conference, but that it was cancelled, and she doesn’t know at this point if it will be rescheduled.
Her latest comments follow an article about the case in the
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette last week, in which Flamm said she thought there was a good chance the case would be settled amicably.
Bauer says that without specifics, she can't comment on the alleged interference by Stealth Volunteers. She did say that as Cavalier’s authorized representatives, she and another Stealth Volunteer, Cindi Nicotera, have gone through lengthy efforts to try to negotiate the return of Bandit.
When there was a concern about how Bandit would travel, Bauer says she arranged for him to either be in the cabin of a plane, or to travel by RV with Bauer and Nicotera. At one point, she says she even had a plane ticket booked, but then the expected reunion fell through again.
A question of respect? To Bauer, it is a question of fundamental justice and respect.
“This man is a senior citizen and so is the dog, and the two of them deserve to spend their twilight time together after a decade of a shared life,” she says, adding that a family member is prepared to take Bandit if Cavalier gets to a point where he can no longer care for him.
“To me, it is a question of respect for the relationship between these two senior gentlemen, the man and the dog, a question of respect for seniors in general, and a question of respect for someone who had lost everything else, to bring back that piece of his heart,” Bauer says.
For his part, Cavalier just misses the dog who used to always be by his side. And he is sure that Bandit misses him.
He says that on those rare occasions when he would leave Bandit, say for a trip to the supermarket, the dog would be so excited when he returned that he would tear around the house and yard in celebration.
“I guarantee if Bandit would see me right now, he’d probably do the same thing,” Cavalier says.
If you would like to contribute to the legal fund to reunite Mr. Cavalier and Bandit, you may do so by emailing questions, or sending money through Paypal, to this address: banditlegal@yahoo.com -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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