September 22, 2008
Thank you, Judge Woolard, for keeping Marjorie Knoller off the streets. Thank you.
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I wrote this January 22, 2004:
Remorseless Sociopathic Freak Paroled Picture this — and change gender-specific words as needed:
You live with your partner of seven years, a loving, well-liked, energetic blonde, in a nice apartment building in a highly desirable neighborhood. One day, your girlfriend gets off work, stops at the grocery store to pick up the makings for your dinner tonight, and goes home. Just as she’s putting the key in the lock of the flat you share together, the next-door neighbor appears in the hallway with her two dogs — a pair of Presa Canarios, each weighing more than 100 pounds — one of which took a nip out of your girlfriend’s hand not long ago.
Your girlfriend never makes it inside.
For reasons you will never know, the dogs make a dead run at your girlfriend, and attack. For the next twelve minutes — which seem an eternity for your other half — your girlfriend is mauled. Her clothes are ripped from her body; only the soles of her feet and the top of her head are spared, as the animals sink their fangs into her throat, her neck, her back…
The hallway leading to the door of your apartment looks like the handiwork of a maniacal Jackson Pollock fan. Your girlfriend’s crimson handprints cover the walls, reaching no higher than four feet off the floor; that’s as far as she could reach once the dogs got hold of her and pulled her down. The carpeting is saturated with your lover’s blood.
When the paramedics get there, she’s still alive, but barely. There is nothing they can do; she’s lost a full third of all the blood in her body through the gaping hole where her larynx used to be.
You wonder if she had a chance to cry before her throat was torn out.
That smooth, tanned, athletic body, of which you knew every inch, intimately, is mutilated, like a badly butchered piece of meat.
You wonder what her last thoughts were.
You wonder what she was planning to make you for dinner that night.
You wonder if you would have spent the evening curled up in front of a movie together, or if you would have forgone the movie and made love instead.
The woman who was supposedly holding the dogs testifies in court that she threw herself between the blood-crazed animals and your girlfriend, but you wonder how she can say that, when she emerges from the scene without herself being soaked in your lover’s blood.
The neighbors who own the dogs never say they’re sorry. That, they say, would be tantamount to admitting guilt. But, beyond failing to make even a perfunctory apology, they refuse to express so much as sympathy for your girlfriend, or for you. In fact, they tell their “adopted” son — a white-supremacist prison inmate who dreams of breeding killer fighting dogs — that even the recognition for your loss would be “kissing ass.”
In the months that follow, it is clear that the couple experiences no remorse, no regret. They mourn the loss of their euthanized dogs, and the loss of their own freedom. They — and not your dead girlfriend — are the victims, you see.
The jury finds your neighbors guilty — him, of involuntary manslaughter and “keeping a mischievous animal that killed a human being,” and her, of the same charges, plus second-degree murder.
To the shock and dismay of everyone (except the couple and their lawyer), the judge throws out the second-degree murder charge. There wasn’t enough evidence, explains the judge, to levy the charge in the first place.
Why then, you wonder, did the judge allow the charge to be filed? If a charge is considered baseless, isn’t the judge supposed to throw it out at the beginning of the trial? Why wait until the end of the trial, after the jury has already agreed with the district attorney?
The neighbors are each sentenced to just four years in prison. He ends up serving just 18 months, and is released in September, 2003, because of his good behavior and work performed behind bars.
Today, his wife is released. And she’s not happy about being paroled to Ventura County, a lovely, clean, coastal community in Southern California, because she doesn’t know what she’ll do with herself there.
As for you? All you can do is cry, for yourself, and for Diane, who isn’t going anywhere.
The Attack
Jurors See Dog Attack Victim Photos. [Diane Whipple] was left naked and bloody, crawling toward her apartment. … [Associated Press, February 19, 2002]
Mauled to Death. Every bit of Whipple’s clothing had been torn off with the exception of a single white sock, and she was still drifting in and out of consciousness when the police arrived (it took two animal control officers and three tranquilizer darts to subdue Bane, the Presa Canario). … [Business Wire, May 11, 2001]
San Franciscans Outraged as They Mourn Victim of Dog Attack. Bane dragged Whipple 20 feet down the hallway. … “She never did get away from those dogs.” … “There was blood and human hair all over the place,” [San Francisco police spokesman Sherman Ackerson] said. “It was so bad officers on the scene needed psychological counseling.” [Maria L. La Ganga and John M. Glionna, Los Angeles Times, January 30, 2001]
Mauled to Death. Almost 90 minutes after Diane was rushed to San Francisco General Hospital on January 26, 2001, Sharon Smith, Diane’s partner, dashed through the same ambulance entrance. The surgeon who had worked on Diane ushered Sharon into the family waiting room and sat her down. His description of Diane’s injuries was nearly impossible to assimilate at the time. Diane’s throat, Sharon would later learn, had been virtually ripped out. By the time the ambulance arrived, almost all the blood had drained out of her body. She was without a pulse for 23 minutes before she could be revived. … [Business Wire, May 11, 2001]
Powerful Dogs Maul Woman, Kill Her. Surgeons spent almost two hours repairing the veins and arteries of her neck. Some of wounds were 1 1/2 inches deep, Isaacs said, and doctors had to insert a tube into her throat to support her trachea. She remained in “very critical” condition for 70 minutes after surgery before dying. [San Francisco Chronicle, January 27, 2001]
No Remorse
Mauled to Death. The hall carpet, soaked with blood and embedded with human tissue, had scarcely been ripped up and replaced with brown paper before Noel and wife Marjorie Knoller began publicly defending the animals. … [Business Wire, May 11, 2001]
Diane Whipple Dog Mauling. The shock that swept San Francisco turned to anger when the dog’s owners, Marjorie Knoller and Robert Noel, expressed little remorse over the tragedy and suggested that the victim’s perfume had provoked the attack. As police proceeded with their investigation, the case took several bizarre turns, including allegations of bestiality between the defendants and the dogs, alleged ties to white supremacist groups and links between the defendants and a dog-fighting ring run out of California’s Pelican Bay State Prison. … [Data Lounge]
Odd History Follows Dogs’ Owner. [Robert Noel] said of Whipple’s family, “I can only imagine the void created in their lives,” then suggested, as he has before, that the mauling was Whipple’s fault. It was somewhat surreal, but still classic Robert Noel, said those who have been in court with him before. … Asked about his seemingly contradictory client list, Noel, who considers himself liberal, joked: “As an attorney, I’ve come in contact with all sorts of people. I’d represent a Republican.” … [Stephanie McCrummen, Newsday, February 3, 2001]
Court Asked to Spare Dog in Whipple Attack. A last minute petition to save the life of one of the two dogs involved in the fatal mauling of Diane Whipple was filed in a San Francisco court on Friday. The San Francisco Chronicle reports David Blatte, a Berkeley attorney, petitioned the court to delay an order to have Hera destroyed. “The original hearing was unfair, the hearing officer was biased and the city violated its own laws in the process,” he said. … The 120-pound Bane is suspected of being the primary aggressor against Whipple … [Data Lounge, Friday, August 10, 2001]
Sick Freaks
Dog Mauling Case Takes Another Strange Turn. A fatal dog mauling case in San Francisco took another odd turn Thursday with suggestions of bestiality and confusion as to whether an implicated attorney will represent his adopted Pelican Bay inmate son. What began as a vicious dog attack that killed a San Francisco woman Jan. 26 has evolved into a bizarre story that has led to a death sentence for the two dogs, public outcry over dangerous canines, and strange revelations about the relationship between a husband-and-wife team of attorneys and a pair of incarcerated convicts. … [KGO-TV, March 1, 2001]
In Letters, Inmate Told Of Plan to Breed Dogs. From his cell at Pelican Bay State Prison in the northwest corner of California, convict Paul Schneider — breeder of Bane, the dog that eventually mauled to death former Manhasset resident Diane Whipple — penned his first cross-country inquiry to dog breeder Mac Harris of Ozone Park, Queens. … [One letter] offers a definition of the dog’s name: “Bane: one who causes death or destroys life.” It explains that Bane was bred for “powerful appearance and severe expression and deep gameness and rusticity.” … [Stephanie McCrummen, Newsday, February 8, 2001]
The stork delivers ‘Cornfed’. Paul “Cornfed” Schneider was already serving a life sentence for attempted murder when he met Noel and Knoller in 1996. … Prosecutors [say] that Schneider, a member of the prison’s white supremacist gang, the Aryan Brotherhood, was raising the dogs as weapons to be used by the Mexican Mafia. Prison officials and prosecutors also say that Schneider showed no concern at all for the loss of Whipple’s life, and that the only emotional reaction stemming from the incident was over injuries Knoller sustained. … [CourtTV, February 15, 2002]
When Good Attorneys Go Bad. Knoller … began sending erotic letters to Schneider depicting threesomes between herself, Noel and their newly adopted son. Soon to follow would be questionable pictures of Knoller with the dogs, whom she referred to as her “licking partner.” Another odd twist to the relationship is the manner in which Noel described Bane to friends on a regular basis. He seemed to have a bizarre affliction for bragging of Bane’s genitalia. “He sees Marjorie, rolls over on his back, and bam, that big red arrow popped out. It was this big [gestures with his hands].” He then said, “Boy, was he hung.” … Knoller and Noel denied that the dogs were trained to attack, but a book entitled, “Manstopper!” a training manual that teaches dogs vicious behavior, was found in their apartment when searched by police. … Knoller and Noels comments on the attack have been even more bizarre than their relationship with Schneider. They suggested that Whipple instigated the attack by wearing pheromone laced perfume, or by menstruating. Knoller said during trial that, “Bane sniffed Whipple’s crotch like a bitch in heat.” Um, can you say weirdo?? … [Lab Productions, March 28, 2002]
The Trial
Emotional openings kick off dog maul trial. Lead prosecutor James Hammer told the jury that Knoller, 46, is guilty of murder, having done nothing before the attack to protect others from dogs she knew were dangerous — or after the attack, leaving a helpless, naked and bloody Whipple in the hallway alone without calling 911. … Hammer also charged that the two dogs, Bane and Hera, who have since been killed, were part of a dog-raising scheme masterminded by Paul “Cornfed” Schneider, a 39-year-old prison inmate whom the defendants legally adopted three days after Whipple’s attack. He detailed the bizarre relationship the married lawyers shared with him. … [CourtTV, February 19, 2002]
Photos preface attack trial. Hammer said Whipple, once described by Noel in a letter as “a timorous little mousy blonde,” was previously bitten on the hand by one of the dogs. He presented letters from witnesses including a veterinarian who warned the couple not to bring the dogs into San Francisco because they “would be a liability in any household.” … [Associated Press, February 20, 2002]
Dog Mauling Trial Begins. The judge on the case, Superior Court Judge James Warren, agreed to exclude testimony about allegations of sexual conduct between Knoller, Noel and their dogs. … [KGO-TV, February 20, 2002]
Bizarre Defense — And Bizarre Defense Attorney
Dog attack lawyer unconventional. Dressed in a conservative skirt and jacket, the wild-haired lawyer crawled across the courtroom floor. She kicked the jury box. She flailed her arms, cried and screamed. Those opening statement images were the first that jurors — and TV viewers nationwide — saw of Nedra Ruiz, a defense attorney in the trial of a San Francisco couple for the fatal dog mauling of their neighbor. … [Said law professor Laurie Levenson] “Most people I talk to just shook their heads. To put it mildly, her style is unusual. It’s borderline bizarre.” … Ruiz, 53, came by theatrics honestly — she spent a year at the American Conservatory Theater … [Associated Press, March 8, 2002]
‘What Ifs’ in Dog Attack. A defense lawyer stunned a Los Angeles courtroom audience yesterday by suggesting that dog mauling victim Diane Whipple’s partner could have prevented the fatal attack. … “Did you ever consider that had you made a complaint, Diane Whipple might be alive today?” defense lawyer Nedra Ruiz asked Sharon Smith, who was Whipple’s partner for seven years. Smith glowered at Ruiz and shook her head in silence. Several members of the courtroom audience gasped. After a momentary pause, Judge James Warren quietly asked, “Do I hear an objection?” One of the prosecutors immediately objected. It was sustained … [Steve Berry and Anna Gorman, Los Angeles Times, March 1, 2002]
The ‘Gay Cabal’ Accusation
Homophobia for the Defense. It’s still an all-too-common courtroom maneuver: A zealous attorney with an unpopular client charged in the death of a gay person argues that the defendant is the innocent victim of sinister gay motives. What should be on trial, the defense attorney suggests, is not the defendant but the way gay people behave. … During her final arguments in March’s trial of Marjorie Knoller for the death last year of Diane Whipple, Knoller’s attorney Nedra Ruiz … suggested that San Francisco assistant district attorney Jim Hammer was deliberately withholding evidence to pander to gays because of their perceived political clout. … “Maybe he wants to curry favor with the homosexual and gay folks who were picketing 2398 Pacific [the apartment building in which Whipple lived with her partner, Sharon Smith] and demanding justice for Diane Whipple. Maybe that’s his motivation for hiding this from you.” The “he” in this case was Hammer, who is openly gay. … [Said Kate Kendell, executive director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights] “I was waiting for the sentence that the prosecutor was hiding this evidence on behalf of the gay cabal because he himself is gay.” … [Hammer] was upset with Ruiz’s allegation that gay politics — and perhaps his own personal interest — played a role in the prosecution. … “All of a sudden it became the lesbian cabal.” Kendell adds, “It’s just unconscionable that an attorney who portrays herself as progressive would play the lavender card and repeatedly try to appeal to whatever antigay prejudice the jurors might have harbored. To the extent that she thought she was pulling the trigger on salacious and inflammatory information helpful to Marjorie Knoller, the gunpowder is all over her face. It couldn’t have backfired more pathetically.” … [John Gallagher, The Advocate, May 14, 2002]
“The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.”. Here’s the deal. You’ll recall from watching the news in recent years that non-traditional families — those consisting of any other combination than one man and one woman — cannot, in most venues, be legally joined in marriage or anything like it. We usually consider this in the case of gay and lesbian life-partnerships — indeed, the dog-maul case lent the weight of tragedy to queer family rights, as Sharon Smith used her high-profile loss to raise consciousness about survivors’ rights. Noel and Knoller’s attorney, Nedra Ruiz, may she burn in hell, even suggested in her closing arguments that her clients were being persecuted as a sop to the powerful gay lobby. (Oh, yes, Nedra, it’s always like that when a gay person dies — someone must pay! Not.) Ironic, then, that Noel and Knoller added Cornfed to their family by resorting to a method many gays and lesbians have been forced to use to access familial rights: adoption. Yep, when grown-ups adopt grown-ups, you can frequently look at it as a sideways form of marriage. Wow, I thought, this shit is deep. … [Carol Queen, Libido]
What the Jury Didn’t Hear
Rolling Stone Report Reveals Contradictory Details In Dog Mauling Case. Evan Wright, Rolling Stone contributing editor: “[Knoller said to Tammy, Schneider’s sister], ‘There was a big argument with my neighbor Diane Whipple prior to the dog attack. We got into it. We had words.” Wright says Knoller asked Whipple to close her door so she could bring the dogs into the hallway. Knoller said Whipple cursed at her. Wright: “And this had preceded by moments the dog attack.” If true, that could strengthen the case against Knoller. But Wright says Tammy has not told her story to investigators. … [KGO-TV, February 4, 2002]
Guilty…
Couple guilty in killer dogs case. One of the dogs tore at Ms Whipple’s clothes, while the other lunged at her throat. She was bitten 77 times and died of loss of blood. Murder charges are rare in dog mauling cases, but the prosecution had brought numerous witnesses who testified that the dogs, Bane and Hera, had terrorised them. … [BBC News, March 22, 2002]
The Diane Whipple Case (People of the State of California v. Marjorie Knoller & Robert Noel). [Jury foreman Don Newton said] that the jury simply did not believe Knoller’s claims that she took the dog to the roof and tried to save Whipple. Newton said that the jury believed that Knoller got covered in blood when she grabbed her dogs after they killed Whipple. Newton repeatedly emphasized that the many contradictions in Knoller’s various comments about the mauling caused the jury to believe she was lying about just about everything. He said that her statements on the day of the killing, on Good Morning America two weeks later, at the grand jury hearing, and at the trial were completely inconsistent. For that reason, he said that the jury disbelieved her version of the mauling. Newton said that there was a mountain of evidence that the dogs were dangerous. … [Dog Bite Law]
…But Justice Denied
Conviction thrown out. A judge threw out a second-degree murder conviction Monday against Marjorie Knoller in the 2001 dog mauling that killed a neighbor, but let stand involuntary manslaughter convictions against Knoller and her husband, Robert Noel. Though Superior Court Judge James Warren said Knoller and Noel are “the most despised couple in this city,” he said the evidence did not support a murder conviction because Knoller had no way of knowing her dogs would kill someone when she left her apartment that day. … San Francisco District Attorney Terence Hallinan said … “I was surprised. I thought this went beyond manslaughter. This was a second-degree murder case. … They should have let that murder count stand.” Sharon Smith, Whipple’s domestic partner, shed a tear as Warren read his ruling. “This is a big shock for Sharon Smith that she didn’t deserve on top of everything else,” Hallinan said. Warren threw out the murder conviction, despite saying he did not believe much of Knoller’s testimony and that both Knoller and Noel acted terribly in the days following the attack. He said they were cavalier about Whipple’s death, and even blamed the dead woman in interviews. “Their conduct from the time that they got the dogs to the weeks after Diane Whipple’s death was despicable,” the judge said. … [Associated Press, June 18, 2002]
Sharon Smith attorney rebukes judge’s decision. An attorney for Sharon Smith, the partner of dog mauling victim Diane Whipple, is blasting San Francisco Superior Court Judge James Warren for implying that a jury’s conviction of second-degree murder against one of the dogs’ caretakers, Marjorie Knoller, was tantamount to vigilante justice. “That really set me back on my heels,” an angry Michael Cardoza told Bay Windows. “I thought he was really overreaching and the hyperbole escaped me. I don’t think he understands second-degree murder. I don’t know how many murder trials he’s tried. He may have gotten in over his head. … Do all judges do this? Do they all take this away? I think that he has created a monster here.” Warren addressed the criticism over his controversial decision at the start of the sentencing hearing. Specifically, Warren addressed comments by Assistant District Attorney Jim Hammer that he “destroyed a sense of justice in San Francisco.” … [Ed Walsh, Tampa Bay Windows]
No Consolation, But Two Small Victories
Partner Wins Right to Sue. In what could prove to be a landmark decision for gay rights activists, a California judge ruled Friday that the wrongful-death lawsuit by the partner of a former Manhasset resident mauled to death by a dog in San Francisco could proceed to trial although she is not a “surviving spouse” under state law. … “This is the first decision of this kind, not just in California, but anywhere in the country,” said Smith’s attorney, Shannon Minter of the National Center for Lesbian Rights. “It’s a tremendous victory for lesbian and gay people in the United States.” Although California law dictates that only surviving spouses or other relatives can bring wrongful-death claims, Superior Court Judge A. James Robertson II said the law violates the equal protection clause of the California Constitution and discriminates against gay couples who cannot legally marry. … Smith and Whipple, a lacrosse coach, had been together for seven years, had exchanged rings in a wedding ceremony and intended to spend the rest of their lives together, Smith said. “Of course we lacked a marriage certificate but we had everything else that a marriage would represent,” Smith added. … [Alfonso A. Castillo, Newsday, July 28, 2001]
Summary of New Legislation. [E]ffective January 1, 2002. … Liability imposed on owners of dangerous animals: AB 1709 (Migden), Stats. 2001, c. 257. Urgency. Amends Section 399 of the [California] Penal Code. This measure revises the provisions of existing law regarding owners of animals that are permitted to be kept at large. The law revises those provisions to also make subject to its proscription any person having custody or control of a mischievous animal and would, in addition, make it a misdemeanor or a felony if the mischievous animal causes serious bodily injury to any human being who has taken all precautions which the circumstances permitted, or which a reasonable person would ordinarily take in the same situation. [Jenkins & Hogin, LLP, April 5, 2002]
Release…
Knoller likely to be freed from prison. Marjorie Knoller, who with her husband made nationwide headlines for their role in the dog mauling death of their neighbor Diane Whipple three years ago, is expected to leave prison today or Friday, prison officials said. Knoller, 48, will be released from Valley State Prison for Women in Chowchilla (Madera County) and serve three years’ parole somewhere in Southern California … [Jim Herron Zamora, San Francisco Chronicle, January 1, 2004]
…But Still No Remorse
Killer Dog Woman Paroled. KTVU said Knoller refused to be interviewed on-camera but that she told the network she was unhappy about being released because she did not know what she would do in Southern California. … [Associated Press, January 2, 2004]
Diane and Sharon
Whipple’s legacy. At age 33, Diane Whipple managed to complete her first marathon in the top 30. Two weeks later, she was dead. Whipple was an avid athlete, a former member of the U.S. Lacrosse team and two-time member of the World Cup Soccer Team. She even came close to qualifying for the 1996 Olympic track team. In October 1999, she left her job as a prep school coach and signed on as women’s lacrosse team coach at St. Mary’s College, a small Catholic school in Moraga, Calif. “She was about being true to yourself, and my courage stems from the life we lived together,” her partner, Sharon Smith, told the San Francisco Examiner. … [CourtTV, February 15, 2002]
An anniversary, but no celebration. There can be few traumas more able to break the heart than the death of one’s lover, best friend, soul mate. Many have endured such loss. Few have had to suffer it in the unique circumstances faced by Sharon Smith. … [Kate Kendell, National Center for Lesbian Rights, January, 2002]
Sadness Over a Light Extinguished. The Rev. James Brown only did his best to explain a God who would allow such a vibrant young woman to be ripped from the Earth so violently. “It’s difficult not to be angry that a loving person like Diane should die because members of the Aryan Brotherhood had spread their hate in the world … That a responsible person like Diane should die because others made reckless choices only compounds the problem,” he said, referring to Whipple’s neighbors, Robert Noel and Marjorie Knoller, who kept the two dogs in an 800-square-foot apartment. “We want justice.” But God is not a puppeteer, he said. God is more “like a coach who puts us in the game where others will break the rules.” … [Stephanie McCrummen, Newsday, February 26, 2001]
Blessings on you, Diane. And peace to you, Sharon.
Today, justice has finally been served:
Dog Owner Sent to Prison for Murder in ’01 Mauling A San Francisco Superior Court judge sentenced a woman to 15 years to life in prison on Monday for her role in an infamous fatal dog mauling.
The sentence came a month after the judge, Charlotte W. Woolard, reinstated a second-degree murder conviction against the woman, Marjorie Knoller, stemming from the 2001 attack that killed Ms. Knoller’s neighbor Diane Whipple. Ms. Whipple, a 33-year-old lacrosse coach, was attacked in the hallway of her building in January 2001 by Ms. Knoller’s two 120-pound dogs and bitten more than 75 times.
… [O]n Monday, Judge Woolard, who took over the case earlier this year, imposed the new sentence, which was hailed by Kamala D. Harris, the San Francisco district attorney. “This defendant is now facing the appropriate punishment,” Ms. Harris said. …
Judge rips Knoller as she sends her to prison for dog-mauling death A judge denounced Marjorie Knoller today for indifference to the fate of a neighbor who was mauled to death by Knoller’s dogs in a San Francisco apartment hallway and sentenced the former attorney to 15 years to life in prison for second-degree murder.
Superior Court Judge Charlotte Woolard, who had reinstated a jury’s murder verdict for the January 2001 attack at a hearing last month, rejected a defense lawyer’s request for probation today and said the horrific circumstances of the crime far outweighed Knoller’s previous crime-free record.
Woolard said Knoller had not bothered to put a muzzle on her aggressive 140-pound dog before taking him out of the apartment and did not call for help, retrieve a weapon or dial 911 while the animal was mauling Diane Whipple for at least 10 minutes.
Knoller “left Ms. Whipple in the hallway to die alone,” the judge said. She said Knoller lied repeatedly in grand jury and trial testimony, has never expressed remorse, and “blamed the victim” in a television interview after the attack.
The 25-minute hearing included a statement from Whipple’s partner, Sharon Smith, who looked at Knoller and declared that more than seven years after “the worst day of my life and the last day of Diane’s life, finally there is some justice.” …
Amen.
Thank you, Judge Woolard.
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Filed Under: California, Crime
