ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, November 7, 1996 TAG: 9611070067
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MATT CHITTUM STAFF WRITER
Botetourt County sheriff's deputies had to use a garden hose to fend off a 140-pound Rottweiler Tuesday night so they could rescue a woman allegedly abducted and beaten in her own house by her ex-boyfriend.
"I've worked in Miami and other places, and I've seen a lot of beatings, but I've never seen one that bad," Deputy Jeff Stritesky said.
Shane Dennis Moorman, 35, of Goodview, was due in Botetourt General District Court Wednesday on a charge of assaulting the woman in a previous incident. Deputies have now charged him with abduction, malicious wounding, malicious assault on a police officer and resisting arrest.
Neighbors called 911 shortly before midnight Tuesday after they saw the man first try to drag the woman into a car in the front yard, and then back into the house, Stritesky said.
But when deputies arrived at the woman's Troutville home, the dog, named Samson, charged them in the driveway, Stritesky said. Neighbors told Stritesky the man put the dog out as soon he got the woman in the house. The dog was calm as long as deputies stayed away from the house.
Stritesky said he called for animal control, but in the meantime, he learned from neighbors that the dog was afraid of the garden hose.
Stritesky held the dog at bay with spray from the hose while deputies ran to the back of the house to try to get in the back door, he said.
The deputies could see a trail of blood on the kitchen floor, and the house was "turned upside down," according to Stritesky. Deputies broke in through the door, but Moorman slammed the door closed, showering them with glass and cutting one deputy's face.
The man was finally subdued with pepper spray.
Stritesky said he found the woman barricaded in the bathroom, naked to the waist and covered in blood. Her eyes were swollen shut. A piece of cord dangled from her ankle.
She was taken to a Roanoke hospital where she was treated and released. She came to Botetourt General District Court Wednesday, in case she was needed to testify against her ex-boyfriend.
The assault trial scheduled for Wednesday - for the previous charge - was continued so the court could hear the new charges against Moorman, along with the old, Clay said. Moorman was being held without bond in the Botetourt County Jail.
Authorities were never able to subdue the Rottweiler on their own.
An animal control officer sprayed the dog with pepper spray three times, but it "just looked at us and sat down on the porch," Stritesky said.
Eventually, the officer shot the dog in the neck with a 9mm handgun, but it ran into some woods and returned an hour later. The animal control officer found a wound, but it was unclear if the bullet had penetrated the dog's skin or just grazed it. The dog, however, seemed unaware of the wound. The victim's ex-husband, who knew the dog, came and took it away.
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