The Lost Dogs: Michael Vick's Dogs and Their Tale of Rescue and Redemption

by Jim Gorant

  For others it was an exciting and happy opportunity. They barked and paced and jumped up on the gate as they awaited their turn. When they were finally let out they bounded up on the man, jumped in the air, tried to run, so that the man had to pull and settle them.

  A few of the dogs simply stood tall at the gate when their turn came, head up, tail wagging. The moments tethered to the wall were a high point for them-a full belly, the thrill of interaction, a different view of the room, and most of all the sensation of space around them. It wasn’t much space, but it was an expanse, compared to the cramped confines of the pen. The feeling carried them even after they were led back to the pen and the gate was latched closed. Sometimes it even lasted for more than a few minutes.

  Fifty miles southeast of Surry, the city of Chesapeake ’s animal shelter held ten of the Bad Newz dogs. One of them, a small black-and-white dog, slept at the back of his kennel. He was younger and smaller than many of the others and not at all sure of himself. He stood out because of his coloring: His body was black with a few white waves that swooshed up from his light belly, while his head was almost all white, except for his right eye and a span under his nose that were both black. They made him look as if he had a black eye and a greasepaint mustache.

  The kennels, more than one hundred of them constructed on two levels, were made of cinder blocks with a chain-link gate. This broke up the noise and meant he could get some seclusion and peace from the dogs on either side of him. But there was also a small opening in the back wall covered by a plastic flap. If the dog walked through, he entered a ten-foot-long run that was all chain link. He could move back and forth freely. This meant that he had a place to relieve himself that was away from where he ate and slept and that he could choose to see other dogs or not. He could jump and trot. He had some space, some options.

  He also had some comforts. In the front section of the run there were either blankets or torn-up newspaper on the floor, which made it soft and warm. He liked to sit there, on the blankets, in the relative quiet of the cinder block-covered section. He liked to sleep.

  The stalls that did not contain animals-smaller ones on top, larger on the bottom-were filled with supplies, clean blankets, detergents, miscellaneous gear. The long squeegees that they used to clean out the pens leaned against the wall and he liked to stare at them.

  There was a lot of activity. A washer and dryer at the end of the row seemed to run almost constantly, cleaning all those blankets. The sound of voices carried in from all around as people came and went. He liked that. It was like white noise that helped drown out other distractions, a soothing soundtrack to his dreams.

  There were people, too, who came to see him. They brought toys and handed out treats. Sometimes they took him for walks outside the small gray building, even though he wasn’t always eager to leave his kennel. Some days when the people came for him, he sat panting rapidly. They had to reach in and slide him out or lure him with food. He loved to eat. When they brought his food, the silver bowls topped off with kibble and water, he jumped up to dig in.

  Truth was, he didn’t mind the small confines of the pen. He was a dog, and like all dogs he was hardwired to live in dens, small dugouts, or caves, spending long parts of the day lolling or sleeping. Of course, dogs also spend much of that time socializing with their pack, something that was impossible to do here. And they are driven to venture out, to forage for food, patrol their territory, explore the world around them. They’re energetic and ambitious creatures. They need exercise and stimulation or they start to lose it. They get “kennel crazy.” It’s an affliction that’s epidemic in shelters. Pit bulls, intelligent and given to activity, are particularly prone to it. Dogs that get it are usually euthanized.

  The dogs around the little black-and-white guy spent the day pacing and barking and running, trying to achieve some semblance of the stimulation they craved, but the black-and-white dog didn’t do much of that at all. Mostly he slept. Those other dogs seemed to be waiting for something to happen, but he was not waiting for anything. He was just waiting.

  He rolled up onto his back and let his legs stick up into the air. He closed his eyes.

  11

  ON THE MORNING OF May 30, Brinkman, Knorr, and Gill met in the parking lot of the Federal Correctional Institution in Petersburg, Virginia, a minimum-security facility that held about one thousand men and offered such amenities as art and music rooms and a full basketball court, including bleachers and an electronic scoreboard.

  The prisoner they were visiting was in on a narcotics conviction-crack distribution-but had also been a dogfighter. Law enforcement was beginning to realize this was a common connection: Bust a dogfight and they were bound to find people guilty of other crimes, not just drug users and gun toters but drug dealers and illegal-weapons traffickers. Studies had also shown that animal cruelty is linked to other types of domestic battery, including spousal and child abuse, and it desensitizes witnesses to violence.

  None of that came up during the sit-down, but the prisoner did tell them he’d met Vick with Purnell Peace in the early days of Bad Newz Kennels and had sold them three pit bulls for a total of $2,900. Later he participated in a fight at 1915 Moonlight Road, putting one of his own dogs against one of Vick’s. There was a $3,000 wager on the line, which his dog won. When it was over Vick told Peace to kill the Bad Newz dog, and the latter shot it with a.22 caliber handgun.

  The interview was a step in the right direction, but as the three men talked outside afterward, Gill stressed that time was of the essence. Knorr and Brinkman pressed on. They climbed into their cars and immediately made the long drive down to the Federal Correctional Institution at Bennettsville, South Carolina. By the time they arrived at the sprawling 670-acre campus about seventy miles northwest of Myrtle Beach, it was too late to go in and talk to the inmates, so they put up for the night in a nearby motel.

  First thing in the morning they made their way over to Bennettsville. A medium-security site, the atmosphere and people inside this place were notably different. There was an air of hostility and violence. The two inmates they met with-also in for crack distribution-were confessed dogfighters and both described fights in the sheds at Moonlight Road. At least one of them told of meeting a Bad Newz representative along the side of the road and of following him to the site. They remembered the white house and the black sheds. They remembered black Escalades and BMWs. The bets ranged as high as $13,000 and the Bad Newz dogs lost every time. According to one of the men, Peace killed at least one dog afterward by wetting it down and electrocuting it.

  They weren’t perfect witnesses; they were convicted felons, for one, and therefore not totally trustworthy, and they were also receiving a reduction in their sentence for agreeing to talk, which gave them a reason to say what the officers wanted to hear. Still, the case wasn’t being built around them. They were just one small link in a growing chain of evidence that was attached to one seemingly inevitable reality: Michael Vick was a dogfighter. He paid for it, he bet on it, he participated in the training, fighting, and killing of dogs with his own two hands.

  The next week passed Jim Knorr in a blur. He spent the first few days on the phone arranging his search team. He wrote up reports of the prison interviews. He brought Brownie up to Richmond for a sit-down with Mike Gill. Finally, on June 6 he spent the entire day writing the affidavit for the warrant. He e-mailed it to Gill late that night and the two made arrangements to meet at Gill’s office at 6:30 A.M. to finalize the document.

  Knorr rose at 4:30 A.M. on June 7, a clear, bright morning that promised to get hot and sticky. In Richmond, he and Gill went over the wording of the affidavit, making a few changes until they were satisfied that it was perfect. At 11:00 A.M. they walked it down the street to the district court, where U.S. Magistrate Judge Dennis Dohnal signed the warrant. By 1:00 P.M. Knorr was back in the parking lot of the Hog Island boat launch. He was once again strapping into his bulletproof vest and gearing up to execute a search of 1915 Moon
light Road. This time it would be different.

  With him now were four other USDA agents and a contingent of Virginia State Police, including a SWAT team and an evidence recovery team. They were going after the bodies. Once again they had no plan for what they would do with the remains once they unearthed them, but right now, with the clock ticking, the whole world watching, and the pressure mounting, it seemed more important to confirm that they existed.

  By this time, Knorr had come to dislike Gerald Poindexter. About the third time they’d met, Poindexter went off on one of his diatribes and Knorr snapped back. Since then, Poindexter had been more deferential, but not much. Knorr was not looking forward to the upcoming conversation, but at about 1:45 P.M., he pulled out his cell phone and dialed Poindexter’s number. When the commonwealth attorney answered, Knorr said, “I wanted to let you know I’m about to serve a federal warrant on 1915 Moonlight Road.”

  According to Knorr, Poindexter responded with a stream of rhetoric filled with righteous indignation and a heavy dose of motherfuckers. The rest of the conversation, as Knorr recalls:

  “What are you searching for?” Poindexter asked.

  “The same things that were in the state warrant you forbid Deputy Brinkman from executing,” Knorr said.

  “Who are the recovery experts?”

  “VSP Evidence Response Team.”

  “Is Brinkman part of the team?”

  “No,” said Knorr, “I couldn’t get Bill on his cell phone this morning.”

  “If you had, would you have wanted him to be there?”

  Knorr responded yes. “Who authorized you?” Poindexter asked.

  “The U.S. attorney’s office for the Eastern District of Virginia.”

  “Who’s in charge of that office?”

  “ U.S. Attorney Chuck Rosenberg.”

  “Is Mr. Rosenberg a football fan?” Poindexter asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “It’s disrespectful,” Poindexter protested. “You don’t have the right to come into my county and execute a search without even letting me or the sheriff know.”

  “The USDA and U.S. attorney’s office don’t notify people before they conduct a search,” Knorr answered. “And as long as your county is in the United States, I absolutely do have the right.”

  “Does Larry Woodward know about it?” Poindexter inquired, referring to Vick’s lawyer. Knorr said that Woodward did not know.

  “Does Gonzales know about it?” he asked, referring to U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

  “Tony Gonzalez?” Knorr responded, throwing out the name of the Pro Bowl tight end for the Kansas City Chiefs.

  “What are you gonna charge him with?” Poindexter said.

  “Animal cruelty.”

  “Does Bush know about it?” Poindexter asked, meaning President George W. Bush.

  “Reggie Bush?” Knorr offered, this time bringing up the New Orleans Saints running back.

  “This doesn’t prevent me from going forward with my case,” Poindexter said. Then he added, “So how many years do you want to give this boy?” He paused. “Thirty years? No, maybe thirty-five years?”

  “I’m not a judge or a prosecutor,” Knorr responded. “I’m just an investigator attempting to obtain the facts.”

  There was some more perfunctory conversation about Bill Brinkman before the commonwealth attorney said, “I guess I should thank you for calling me.”

  After he did, Knorr hung up the phone, got in the car, and began the drive to Moonlight Road.

  They could not find the dogs. They had been on the site for half an hour, digging in the spots Brownie had marked on a crude map he’d drawn for Knorr, but they were finding nothing. The vegetation was thick and the ground wet. Brownie had been very specific about where he had dug the holes. If those dogs weren’t where he said they were, the case was just about done.

  Knorr got on the phone. He called Brownie and asked for more directions. Still nothing. He called Mike Gill and asked for permission to bring Brownie out to the site. Gill took the request to the magistrate judge who had approved the warrant, and the judge gave the okay. A short while later the Virginia State Police delivered Brownie to 1915 Moonlight Road, and he pointed out the exact spot where they should dig. Now, Knorr could see how the ground cover was different and the terrain varied from the area around it, but he never would have noticed it without Brownie to show the way.

  The forensics team began digging anew. They started with spades, and after they got down a few feet, they moved to smaller trowels. About an inch and a half of rain had fallen in the previous three days, making the ground soggy and heavy. The digging was slow, and even after they’d cleared an area to a depth of about three feet, they found nothing.

  Knorr paced. It was a party for the ticks, and Knorr had to continually pick them off his legs and arms as he talked on his cell phone. The heat was staggering: 89 degrees with 88 percent humidity and no breeze. The air felt heavier than the dirt, but the officers kept at it. Finally, there in the dank and crumbling soil was the unmistakable brush of fur.

  Now the process slowed to a crawl. The officers moved even more deliberately so as not to damage the bodies, excavating around them with their hands. Knorr’s stomach turned. He stared at the sky as he walked through ferns and scrub. He saw the squirrels scampering through the trees, smelled the loam of the earth and felt the stillness and the heat. He checked back on the dig site. The bodies had begun to emerge, and with them arose a stench that turned Knorr back. It was the worst thing he’d ever smelled, a combination of rotting meat and an old blanket that had been left festering in a steamy basement.

  He found other ways to stay busy. About two hours into the search Vick’s attorney, Larry Woodward, showed up requesting a copy of the warrant. Knorr was happy to oblige, and as he turned over the paperwork he asked Woodward how he had found out about the search. Woodward chuckled. “Someone in Surry County called me,” he said.

  Otherwise, the day’s objectives included another look around all the buildings. In the big shed they recovered a few pieces of stained wood from the fighting pit. They picked up spent shell casings around the yard and more medical supplies and syringes. Brownie had said that the crew usually wore coveralls to kill the dogs because they didn’t want to get their clothes dirty, and in the garage Knorr and company found two pairs, splattered with what appeared to be blood.

  At last the job was done. There in two holes lay eight dead dogs, four in each. Many of them were tangled together and overlapping, but there had been very little decomposition, so they appeared as if they had died only moments earlier. Some still wore collars. One had her legs curled up under her body, her eyes closed and her chin resting on the ground. She looked so peaceful that if he didn’t know better Knorr would have sworn she was sleeping.

  They still had no place to take the bodies and really no means of removing them, so they decided on a new plan. They removed one tooth from each dog. These would serve as physical evidence and also potentially provide a DNA link to the bodies if needed. Afterward, they returned the bodies to the ground as nearly as possible to the way they had found them. Then they covered them with dirt and patted the ground flat.

  It was after 7:00 P.M. and Knorr still had a three-and-a-half-hour drive ahead of him. He peeled off his sweat-soaked shirt and threw it into the trunk of his car, then pulled on a fresh one he had brought along. It wasn’t enough. When he arrived home his dog, BJ, freaked out. She barked madly and ran away from him, from the smell of death that clung to his clothes and body. She would not come near him until he had showered and changed.

  This did not bother Knorr as much as one other thing. It ate at his mind for the long drive home and all through the night. Everything had been exactly as Brownie had described, except for one detail. He had told them about one dog that died in a way even more horrific than the rest. That body was not among the others. There was no sign of the little red dog.

  “What is foreign to me is
the federal government getting into a dogfighting case. I know it has been done, but what is driving this? Is it this boy’s celebrity? Would they have done this if it wasn’t Michael Vick?” Gerald Poindexter asked.

  The media had arrived within a half hour of the search’s beginning, and reporters had kept a vigil ever since. Some stood along the fence, peeking into the yard. Others parked their cars at the Ferguson Grove church and waited. Many of them called Poindexter, and he didn’t disappoint.

  Poindexter told reporters he was “absolutely floored” by the latest developments. “Apparently these people want it. They want it, and I don’t believe they want it because of the serious criminal consequences involved… They want it because Michael Vick may be involved.”

  “If they’ve made a judgment that we’re not acting prudently and with dispatch based on what we have, they’re not acting very wisely.”

  “There’s a larger thing here, and it has nothing to do with any breach of protocol. There’s something awful going on here. I don’t know if it’s racial. I don’t know what it is.”

  Poindexter’s outburst, combined with the news that the feds had opened their own case, caused quite a stir. News outlets and opinion mongers from the sports world to the cable chat fests to the afternoon talk shows chimed in. Animal rights groups redoubled their efforts, appearing seemingly everywhere, staging protests, and ratcheting up the pressure even further. As always, Gill, Knorr, and anyone involved in the federal investigation remained silent.

  Inside, though, Knorr churned. He paid little attention to Poindexter; he had a long career of evenhanded work to support him. What he had dreamed of-what he had asked his wife to pray for-was a dogfighting case, a chance to help animals, not a chance to persecute any particular subset of people. But what the media storm made clear was that this case was unlike so many of the others he’d handled before.