Sebastian Marinkovich (right) and lawyer Tony Bamford in the Nelson District Court after a bid for name suppression was declined on charges laid after his two dogs mauled a seal. Photo / Tracy Neal.
Warning: This story contains images of an injured animal that readers may find distressing.
The owner of two dogs that mauled a seal thought the most humane thing to do would be to let the dogs continue so the animal’s suffering would be over sooner.
“By the time I got to the seal, it was pretty clear to me that the damage was done,” Sebastian Marinkovich told police, in a panicked state, when they arrived at the beach soon after.
The 42-year-old has been sentenced on two Department of Conservation (DoC) charges he admitted earlier of being the owner of a dog that attacked a seal, which is a protected marine mammal.
Today, in the Nelson District Court he was declined name suppression and lost his fight to save his dogs from destruction, which followed his unsuccessful bid for a discharge without conviction.
“I accept this will be upsetting for you, but the dogs will need to be destroyed,” Judge Jo Rielly said after lengthy consideration of the circumstances around what happened.
In the late afternoon of September 7 last year, Marinkovich was walking his two dogs, a retriever/labrador named Bo, and a grey German shepherd/Siberian husky named Koda, off lead on Kina Beach south of Motueka.
He was in the designated dog exercise area when they spotted a fur seal near the water. One ran off towards it and the other followed.
The attack, which lasted about 30 minutes, despite Marinkovich being nearby, left punctures in the seal’s neck and head, DoC said in a summary of facts.
Marinkovich’s lawyer Tony Bamford said it was not clear what triggered the dogs to act like they did and whether the seal might have acted in a way that made the dogs react.
“Whatever the reason, one dog attacked and the other one joined in.”
Bamford said Marinkovich panicked and didn’t know what to do, but conceded he should have intervened earlier.
DoC said the seal was unable to defend itself or escape into the ocean.
Police turned up after a member of the public called them. Marinkovich told them he noticed the dogs had spotted something near the water’s edge, which, at the time, he had not realised was a seal.
He said what happened was “very uncharacteristic”.
“They just absolutely ‘went’ and I had no way of stopping them,” he told the police.
He said both dogs were domesticated and normally very docile.
Police placed the seal they presumed was dead on some nearby rocks, but when a DoC officer arrived the next morning to collect it, it could not be found.
Bamford argued seals were “hardy, resilient” animals that faced heavier predation at sea and it was safe to conclude the animal in this case did not die.
“Many more seals die from fishing-related activity than attacks by dogs or humans,” he said.
Judge Rielly said it was more likely the seal had died as a result of the attack or was critically injured and later died.
She said the attack involving two dogs would have “most certainly” been traumatic for the seal.
Bamford said Marinkovich was horrified by what had happened and had apologised to DoC.
The dogs were later surrendered to the Tasman District Council and temporarily impounded but released days later back to Marinkovich.
They had since been kept in an enclosed yard and muzzled when taken out in public.
Prosecutor Mike Bodie said the “prolonged mauling” of a warm-blooded animal that felt pain and trauma was concerning, as was Marinkovich’s apparent lack of empathy at the time.
He said, “rightly or wrongly”, Parliament had decided that people and wildlife deserved the same level of protection from dog attacks.
Bodie said the court must impose a destruction order, for consistency next to other similar cases.
Under the Dog Control Act, an order for the destruction of a dog could be made unless satisfied that the circumstances of the offence were exceptional and did not warrant such a move.
“Yes, it will be devastating but that’s the case for anyone,” Bodie said in arguing Marinkovich presented no exceptional circumstances against such an order.
Judge Rielly said almost every person who appeared in courts around the country for such offending involving a beloved pet felt an “acute sense of trepidation and grief over a pet being destroyed”.
But in this case, it was “hard to understand” how Marinkovich could have seen his beloved pets attack a seal for 30 minutes and not stop it.
Judge Rielly accepted an explanation that earlier head injuries he suffered might have compromised his ability to function and to react, but in the absence of any expert evidence, the court was unable to put much weight on that suggestion.
“You are a highly regarded member of the community and a much-loved husband and father who lives a very pro-social lifestyle, and who cares greatly for a family which is very traumatised by this,” she said.
Marinkovich was fined $1000 on each charge, from a potential maximum $3000 fine on each.
DoC said the native New Zealand fur seal was slowly recovering having been hunted almost to extinction in the 19th century.
Because of the amount of time spent on beaches and near the public, fur seals were susceptible to risks posed by dogs.
Tracy Neal is a Nelson-based Open Justice reporter at NZME. She was previously RNZ’s regional reporter in Nelson-Marlborough and has covered general news, including court and local government for the Nelson Mail.