Kody Connick said he was never much of a student, let alone a writer. He hated English and got into trouble at school.

“It was just seeing friends and trying to get by through the day,” he said.

But the 14-year-old teen from Lincoln recently put fingers to the keyboard and is now selling his story.  Connick got sick last winter and something sparked an unrealized passion. He sat down and began writing about dogfighting.  His narrator is a pit bull.

Through the dog’s eyes, the reader is witness to the horror, Connick said.”Fighting and chomping on Shadow’s neck, I tasted blood. I tasted madness, then I tasted sorrow,” the teen read from the book, which has sold 60 copies and is in its second printing.  “My owner Jake shouted, ‘Go get him, be the king you’re meant to be tonight. Tear his heart out,’” Connick read.

He was compelled to write about the cruel way people treat pit bulls and the notorious reputation the dogs possess.”It’s how you train a dog and it’s how you treat it.  So there’s no bad dog, ever,” Connick said.  He said he drew upon his own experience with friends who own pit bulls, researched the issue and then began to write.

“In the first two days, I had 20 pages done,” he said.  Four months later, Wild Hearts was finished. It’s a story about a juvenile delinquent and a pit bull whose lives become intertwined.

Kevin Connick couldn’t believe what his son had written.”Very detailed, very good story — I was shocked,” the boy’s father said.

Kody said people see him as wanting to be a gangster, a bad kid. The book has changed the way people look at him and the way he looks at school, he said.”It actually opened my eyes that I could do something if I worked hard enough and focused,” Connick said.

He plans on writing another book in the future. He said he’s also paying more attention in school and wants to go to college.

 Share now!

A coroner says an Ohio woman suffered a heart attack before collapsing in her driveway while bringing in the pet Rottweiler that was destroyed after being blamed for mauling her to death.

Cuyahoga County Coroner Frank Miller said Tuesday that there were few dog bites on 63-year-old Carolyn Baker of Cleveland Heights, who died in February. He says there were signs of pawing, showing that “the dog was trying to help her.”

Baker had gone outside in a nightgown to bring in the 140-pound dog named Zeus. Miller says hypothermia also contributed to the death of Baker, who was outdoors for several hours before a neighbor heard the animal barking.

Baker’s family had believed the 9-year-old dog was trying to rescue her.

The Cleveland Municipal Court ordered the dog destroyed in April.

 Share now!

Lino Camacho of Farmersville has a habit of saving lives and protecting the defenseless.

The 17-year-old did it again Thursday, witnesses and police reported, in what could easily have been a tragic loss of life.

“This young man chose to save a precious young life, endangering his own in the process,” said Lt. Mike Marquez of the Farmersville Police Department.

Camacho snatched life from the jaws of death, as 18-month old Nevaeh Baxter was attacked by a family pet — a mixed-breed dog, part German shepherd and part boxer — around 9:20 a.m. Thursday.

“Seniors didn’t have to go in early Thursday because of STAR testing [at Farmersville High School],” Camacho said. “That turned out to be a very lucky thing.”

Camacho and his brother Luis, 19, who will be attending College of the Sequoias this fall, heard what Lino thought were “two dogs fighting.”

However, one of those sounds was the screaming of the girl as she was attacked. That was what Lino saw as he ran across the street and scaled two fences to reach the scene in the 500 block of North Ventura Street in Farmersville.

Lino’s athleticism — he played soccer for Farmersville’s championship boys soccer squad — proved valuable.

“I couldn’t have gotten there in time,” Luis said. “By the time I got to the backyard by going on the roof, I saw Lino grabbing the dog with a chokehold.”

Lino said he would have killed the dog if he had to — but managed to just hang on until help arrived. The dog is now being sheltered at the Valley Oak SPCA until a decision is made under Farmersville’s vicious-dog ordinance on whether to euthanize the animal.

Little Nevaeh underwent surgery Friday at Fresno’s Community Regional Medical Center for several injuries, including puncture wounds and a cut to the face which affected at least one eye. She is listed in “critical but stable” condition, Marquez said.

“It looks like the eye will be saved,” said Cynthia Anaya, Lino’s mother and a friend of Nevaeh’s family.

More rescues

Four years ago, as a freshman at Tulare Union High School, Lino saved a classmate from drowning in the school’s pool, Luis said.

“This one guy was diving in and never came back up,” Luis said.

Lino said he instinctively jumped in and managed to keep the struggling, panicky boy’s head above water.

“He was kicking me all over the place, but I kept grabbing at him until I could get him to the [pool's] edge,” Lino said.

In another more recent incident, Lino saved his cousin Veronica Anaya from what she said was a “dangerous snake.”

“This snake was hissing and trying to strike at me,” Anaya said.

Lino took care of the problem by simply killing the snake, she said.

“That was the only thing he could do,” Anaya said.

Some people were born to save others, said Lino’s uncle, Joe Anaya III.

“That’s what Lino wants to do when he gets older,” Joe said. “He wants to save lives. He certainly did the right thing this time around.”

 Share now!

Two felony animal cruelty charges, punishable by up to three years in prison, were filed Thursday against a man stemming from the hogtying of a pit bull found April 22 abandoned and hungry in a field of mud southwest of Lamont.

James D. Worley, 52, who was arrested April 26, will be arraigned Friday in the Lamont division of Kern County Superior Court.

The first charge alleges maiming or torturing the dog and the second alleges deprivation of drink or food. The maximum punishment for the felony charges is three years in prison, Assistant District Attorney Michael Saleen said.

Worley is also charged with a misdemeanor count of dog abandonment.

As of Thursday afternoon, nearly 2,000 people had signed a petition asking that the suspect be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, according to the petition website.

The dog was wrapped around its mouth, neck and legs with boot laces. It was found in a field off Adobe Road near Sandrini Road.

The dog was named England after Animal Control Officer Kristen England, who responded to a call and took the dog to the Kern County Animal Shelter.

An animal rescue group, The Jason Debus Heigl Foundation, founded by Nancy Heigl and her daughter, actress Katherine Heigl, picked up England on Wednesday with the intention of rehabilitating the dog for possible future adoption.

 Share now!

Anyone and Everyone, please share this with everyone you know!!

Salons, groomers, individuals can sign up to donate hair and fur clippins and nylons for our Oil Spill Booms.  The program sign up is free, fast and helps them coordinate the masses of donations.

Thousands of pounds of hair and nylons are coming in by UPS and FED EX from every State in the US and from Canada, Brazil, France, UK… Booms are being made all along the Gulf Coast near beaches and marshes. What a community feeling!

Visit MatterofTrust.org today!!

 Share now!