National Georgraphic Presents 'The Dog Strangler'
In a story that is sure to shake Hollywood's dog-psychology establishment to its very foundations, a TV producer is suing Cesar Millan, better know to National Geographic Channel viewers as "The Dog Whisperer," for the mistreatment of his beloved Lab:
In a lawsuit filed Thursday in Superior Court, 8 Simple Rules producer Flody Suarez says he took 5-year-old Gator to the Dog Psychology Center on Feb. 27 to deal with fears of other dogs and strangers.
Hours after dropping the dog off at the facility, Suarez claimed a worker called to inform him the animal had been rushed to a veterinarian. He later found the dog "bleeding from his mouth and nose, in an oxygen tent gasping for breath and with severe bruising to his back inner thighs," the lawsuit claims.
The facility's workers allegedly placed a choke collar on the dog, pulled him onto a treadmill and forced him to "overwork." Suarez says he spent at least $25,000 on medical bills and the dog must undergo more surgeries for damage to his esophagus.
How can we ever know that Gator, finally feeling safe in the presence of a human who could actually understand him, didn't ask that his therapist help him indulge his long-repressed sadomasochistic fantasies? This case seems almost impossible to prosecute unless a local judge is willing to undermine the sacrosanct canine/whisperer privilege that has made Los Angeles' pet-pampering industry the envy of the world.
