Three Poodle Breeders Fined by Judge

It is unfortunate that the show world seems to encourage bad behavior among exhibitors, but none in the recent past have ever reached the heights of despicable behavior than that of Lucy Tyler of Pennsylvania who in the past has been a vendor at the Poodle Club of America (PCA)'s National Specialty Show. If you are not aware of who this woman is, let me tell you a little of her history, which I detailed in my first poodle book, Staring the Dragon in the Eye: The Hidden Victims of Animal Extremists. Before Tyler became involved in the poodle show world, she was an Olympic bicycle competitor who was previously expelled from the 1998 Commonwealth Games and became the first Australian competitor to ever be sent home in disgrace. She tried to blame her failures on the coach claiming he was forcing the team to use drugs but in reality both her first and second husbands received bans from competition for drug use.

What in the karma of the poodle world led her here, who knows, but we couldn't have had a worse person join our ranks. When I first met her on the United Kennel Club (UKC) show circuit she was passing around vicious rumors that top AKC handler Kaz Hosaka obtained his high standing in this country by beating, abusing, and torturing the dogs in his care, oh and because his backer Anne Rogers Clark paid off people. She then went on to accuse the breeder of her dogs, Jacki Panzik of Admiration Poodles, California of beating, abusing, and torturing her dogs during PCA's National Specialty Show in 2009, when she showed her dogs in brace. Then Lucy Tyler asked me, did I know how she could get away with breaking the contract she had with Admiration over the purchase of those dogs? I stayed far away from this woman every time I saw her at local dog shows but shortly after I met her, her reputation was made across the entire poodle fancy as a vicious out of control bully who was willing to take down anyone she could to gratify her own ego.

One of the first truly outrageous public acts she committed that I'm personally aware of was to threaten a Midwest AKC dog handler with death. Lucy Tyler posted to the internet on a poodle message forum, "I've been using *67 (which masks the ID of the number calling) and I've been calling that selfish, murderous bitch every 3 minutes on both numbers. I'm going to program the phones to keep doing it. Oh-and I've left a number of non-charming personal messages for that killer." She then posted that she had contacted the animal rights group PETA to ask for help in taking down this woman that she was stalking. She posted this poor handlers email address and phone number and then asked fellow poodle owners to join her in threatening the life of this woman and people did. Next she started a campaign to stalk AKC Judges if they awarded a win to a dog that Tyler felt was unworthy, calling the AKC a bunch of American Kennel Crooks. She recommended that her stalking campaign of AKC judges should include the following tenants, "1.) Prepare, 2.) Look for vulnerabilities, and 3.) Strike with intelligence and ferocity." She also posted repeatedly that her current boyfriend owns up to 60 guns and they are prepared to shoot anyone who disagrees with them. 

2 WP's miniature poodles at a show in Maryland.
Behind them is stalker Lucy Tyler and boyfriend.

The next outrageous act she committed was to steal a standard poodle from Antigua Poodles of Texas and then commit a massive act of defamation against Antigua Poodles of Texas and Shamayim Poodles of Virginia to cover her tracks by accusing both breeders of horrific acts of abuse in 2009. Lucy Tyler posted on a internet poodle message board, about Melissa Priddy of Antigua Poodles, "She's a paranoid piece of shit though and I expect backlash. Two possible avenues will be threatening to expose her or, if she'll calm down and shut up, we might pay her off." She also claimed that her boyfriend wanted to shoot and kill Priddy. Lucy Tyler then speculated about contacting PETA to take down and destroy Shamayim Poodles of Virginia and posted that Deborah Futrell was a cruel sadistic drug addled bitch, who as Lucy Tyler posted, "has slipped probably from the cocktail of depression, squalor and valium has gotten sloppier still." Numerous poodle owners joined in this cyber lynch mob to destroy both breeders and send them death threats on nothing more than Lucy Tyler's say so after she openly admitted that she had stolen and registered "Denzel" under a fraudulent name with UKC to gain registration papers on him.

"I was the 1 she dubbed Fat M & Stupid Texan (until theft charges were filed, search warrant was executed, & PI hired to safely retrieve my dog from her home.)  This wasn't what had me in tears, it was the threats she made of stealing my dogs, shooting to kill me & my family.  This is why we have not gone to PCA since 2009.  The police feared for my safety after meeting her."  Melissa Priddy, Antigua Poodles.

After Lucy Tyler lost custody of the stolen dog (AM GRCH Antigua Granting Wishes) she had renamed "Denzel" she then turned her attentions against me. She was already frustrated that her dogs were losing in local UKC shows that both she and I attended. She then became friends with two other poodle breeders who both were attempting to rip me off. That unholy trio of Lucy Tyler, Maggie Laney (Highfalutin Poodles, California) and Sandy Walter (Amandi Poodles, Pennsylvania) joined in a cyber lynch mob against my reputation and spread many ugly and utterly false stories about me. Lucy Tyler accused me of being an evil monster and some sort of major cyber hacker who had somehow gained access to her accounts. They also collaborated with a local animal rights terrorist with connections to the animal rights group, the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), who then raided me and destroyed the entire Whispering Pines poodle line in 2010.

Posting About Me:   "I hate her guts, personally, because she committed a series of cyber crimes including cyber terrorism against myself and another respected SPCR member and in league with some known Poodle neglectors/abusers. 
She did this just to meddle during the Denzel Debacle."
 Flickr post by Lucy Tyler, April 23, 2010.

Actually, this serial liar just made this up out of her fertile imagination. I had no part in that case and didn't even know Melissa Priddy of Antigua Poodles at that time. My entire poodle line, my reputation, and my financial viability was completely destroyed by this woman and her two pals. After their actions, I did the only thing left to me. I wrote a book about my poodles lives, Staring the Dragon in the Eye: The Hidden Victims of Animal Extremists, that exposed the behavior of all three women and ultimately what happened to my dogs.

"I was forced to stand there for hours watching all my years of hard work destroyed, watching my home destroyed, watching photos taken of 'mud' and labeled as feces knowing these photos will go out via social media to destroy my reputation creates pain that cannot be imagined. I was forced to stand there watching the ignorant and the clueless mistreat my dogs. That they did not know that what they were doing was wrong creates pain that cannot be imagined. To have to stand there and be able to do absolutely nothing and not lash out at the raid force and the cops who stood by and let it happen, is the epitome of self-restraint. Don't ask me how I did it. Part of me died that day. I knew my life was gone, my dogs destroyed, and I did the only thing I could do. I did my best to document what they did so I could share it with the world." 
 Katharine Dokken

The poodle show world was ready to believe that I was some sort of vicious puppy miller, after all, I was "that woman" who dared to bring a brown and white standard parti poodle to the infamous PCA National Specialty Show in 2007. The very same specialty show where PCA leaders deliberately humiliated handler Kay Palade and Versatility in Poodles President Irma Shanahan in the show ring over their multi-colored poodles. The very same show that the public backlash was so vicious that PCA was forced to retract their very public anti-parti stance. It wasn't any stretch of the imagination for these people to believe that "that woman" who believed that multi-colored poodles have just as much right to life as their solid colored brethren was some sort of puppy miller just because a vicious bully and an animal rights terrorist said so.

After their successful destruction of my dogs, Lucy Tyler then turned her malicious actions against Ora Marcus, Ormar Poodles of Canada. Once again, when you look behind the scenes of that tragedy, fellow breeders were attempting to gain free breeding stock from Ora Marcus without having to pay for it. A typical pattern in the show world in which some older more established breeders seem to feel they have the right to rip off newer breeders. But Ora Marcus fought back and sued Lucy Tyler and the two other breeders who targeted her. Recently a Canadian court agreed with her and issued a massive fine against all three women.

Of Lucy Tyler's internet defamation, the Judge ruled, "To say the least, they are injurious, degrading and insulting towards Ms. Marcus." The Judge also noted that Lucy Tyler had accused Ms. Marcus of dyeing her poodles noses and producing diseased puppies, both false. After Lucy Tyler set off a massive internet firestorm of defamation against Ora Marcus on Facebook, she posted, "Have a great weekend, Orahole!"

Finally in 2016, Ora Marcus gained vindication. The Judge ruled that over $120,000 in fines are appropriate for these poodle breeders behavior in turning on one of their own for their own selfish gain.

"Ms. Marcus has suffered significant stress as a result of Defendants' intentionally malicious and defamatory lies.  She lost her "joie de vivre" and became depressed.  Her passion for puppies diminished and she reduced her presence in poodle shows because she was afraid of other exhibitors' reaction and behavior towards her."
 Judge Andre Prevost.

This is not Lucy Tyler's first rodeo. She has slandered the reputation of multiple other poodle owners with others cheering her on and believing all of her lies. It is this type of brutal arrogance that is playing right into the hands of the animal rights movement and turning pet owners against show breeders.

As another interesting side note, I noted in the court judgment against Tyler and her pals, that they attempted to make up a fake contract and tried to use in it in the court case to cover their behavior. The Judge rightly saw that it was an attempt "ex post facto" to cover their tracks. This is typical behavior of these woman. Besides Tyler's asking me how to break her Admiration contract, I can testify that I spent way too many long telephone calls with Maggie Laney in the years prior to my case as she attempted to evade her contracts with Vetset Poodles in Canada and continuously asked my advice on how to get away with breaking them and still get AKC papers on the dogs. For the record, I constantly advised Maggie Laney to fulfill the contract terms she had agreed to with Vetset every time she asked. I was not surprised when Vetset finally repo'd one of the two dogs they had sold her, the dog now known as AM/CH CH Vetset Highfalutin' Hallmark.

Look around the show ring at your next show. Just how many newcomers do you see under 40? 50? 60? There are almost no newcomers to the show world anymore. Those that do come, stay a few years and then they leave. Dog showing is a dying sport and breeders are facing mandatory spay/neuter and anti-breeding ordinances all across this country promoted by the animal rights movement. Between getting ripped off by established breeders and dealing with vicious bullies like Lucy Tyler, is it any wonder the show world is dying? Is it any wonder that newcomers don't stay when they see the establishment back the bullies instead of the victims? The average member of the public has turned their backs on purebred dogs, falling for the constant mantra of "Adopt, Don't Shop" from the animal rights world. The behavior of the show world supporting and cheering on people like Lucy Tyler as she destroys strangers for fun and kicks is just one more nail in that coffin. When you have lost the support of the public, you have lost it all.

As for me, I have moved on with my life after the destruction of my lines. I no longer show poodles and instead am now a nationally known author and speaker. In the next year I plan on releasing my next book on poodles. What Lucy Tyler and the animal rights extremist she collaborated with did to me did not destroy my love of poodles.