Bela is a 9-year-old German Shepherd, and apparently a healthy one.

Unfortunately, Bela’s owner, Connie Ley, isn’t healthy. In fact, she’s dead. But Connie loved Bela, and provided for her in her will. The provision: Bela could either be adopted by one of Connie’s friends (That’s out: the friend doesn’t want her), euthanized, cremated and buried along with Ley, or sent to a no-kill animal sanctuary to live out her days in comfort. I may be presumptuous here, but I think I know which of these options Bela would prefer. It’s not her call, however. The executor of the will gets to make the choice, and he or she is reportedly leaning to having Bela killed.

The Best Friends Animal Society  is working on trying to convince the will’s executor to allow Bela to live, and be brought to the group’s facilities in southern Utah joining some 1,700 other cats, dogs, horses, pigs, birds and other animals.  There she would be available for adoption, and if not adopted, cared for, if not exactly the center of attention in a loving family. Better than being buried like a cat mummy with a Pharaoh, though, I’d think. One problem is that while the will identifies Best Friends as an option, there are no provisions in it to compensate the group, and Ley had never contacted it before she died. Another problem is that Bela was a one-woman dog. That, however, can usually be changed with love, patience, and time. Many dog lovers seem willing to make the effort.

Best Friends is still leading a campaign to save Bela, asking supporters to use the hashtag #SaveBela on social media, and explaining,

We want to save Bela’s life and bring him to our sanctuary, but the decision to send him to us or have him put down and cremated is out of our hands. The decision needs to be made by the person designated in Ms. Ley’s will, and we are hopeful that she will agree. Please be patient as we educate her about Best Friends’ life-saving mission and demonstrate that Bela will be in good hands.

Please show your support for Bela to come to Best Friends by adding your positive message of hope for Bela to have a safe and happy holiday by using the hashtag ‪#‎SaveBela‬.

Naturally, the estate lawyer handing Connie’s affairs is all huffy about this.

“The dog was owned by my client and now it’s part of her estate,” lawyer Doug Denmure told Ohio TV station WCPO. “And those are her wishes, as far as the future of the dog is concerned. Outsiders don’t have the grounds to rewrite the provisions of my client’s will and impose what they want.”

Not so fast, Dog Breath! As Gerry W. Beyer, a professor at Texas Tech University School of Law who has a blog about estate planning issues and has written frequently about wills that provide for pets points out, judges have sometimes refused to enforce owners’ requests that their pets be euthanized, on the grounds that those requests are “against public policy or unethical.”

“It is true in our legal system that pets are property, thus giving Connie the ability to determine Bela’s disposition upon Connie’s death. However, courts in the United States in similar cases in the past have been extremely reluctant to honor ‘pet killing’ provisions,” Beyer says. “The power to dispose of property does not necessarily include the power to destroy that property. By analogy, it would be unlikely that a court would enforce a will provision stating, ‘Place all my property in my house. Then, douse the house with gasoline and burn everything to the ground.'”

Ethically, this is an easy call. Cruelty to animals is wrong, and if killing a healthy animal because a dead owner wants it that way isn’t being cruel, what is? Once there is an individual or a group that is willing to care for Bela, it would be unethical for the estate to have her killed. The argument that the importance of abiding by the dead owner’s wishes takes precedence over the live dog’s existence may have a place in the law, but the result is ethically indefensible. Connie is beyond caring. Bela has some living to do.

Canine lives matter too.

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Source: Indianapolis Star,  Huffington Post