Dear dog lovers,
On January 19th 2022, Maya's thief Marc Pareit has been convicted AGAIN by the Belgian courts to return our Leonberger Maya. The court's decision refered to the false registration of our dog in the national database dogID, as a tool that enables dog thieves to falsely present themselves as the owner of a dog. As was pointed out correctly in parliament, chipping and registering your dog legalizes dog theft as it basically takes 1 minute for a non-law-abiding veterinary to modify the information of the owner into that of a dog thief in the computer system. You can read Marc Pareit's first conviction of 2021 here and his second conviction here. Media published the verdict as well, an example here.
Our Maya has been locked up and neglected for almost 2 years now by the daughter of Maya's thief, Mieke Pareit. Our Maya never leaves the house. The neighbours have never even seen her going out for a single walk in all this time. Until this very day, Maya is still not reunited with her family.
However, both Belgian and European law foresee that falsification of identification documents is strictly prohibited. In case of falsification (as is the case with our Maya) the law allows to seize a dog immediately and return it to its legitimate owners immediately.
The Belgian government was informed of the false registration of our stolen Maya in dogID already in 2020. They claimed there was nothing they could do, I supposedly had no choice but to go to court, which is expensive and which takes years as dogs are not considered as living beings in Belgium but as goods.
What a contrast with Spain, who just like Austria, Germany, Portugal and other countries, recently modified 3 laws that stipulate and reinforce that pets are an integrated part of the family. In case of a divorce for example, the judges must now foresee custody for the pets in the same way as they do for kids.
You'll surely understand my surprise when the dog Barry, whose identification documents had also been falsified through dogID despite the fact that the identity and contact information of the legitimate owner were known, was returned to his legitimate owner in only a couple days (and fortunately so !!) upon orders of the same service that has been telling me there's nothing they can do to bring back our Maya ...
That's right : the same service (Dierenwelzijn) of the same Minister (Ben Weyts) orders in Barry's case to return the dog at once to its owner - and in Maya's case, which is similar and from a legal point of view practically identical, they still keep claiming they can NOT order Maya's thieves to return our Maya to its owner at once - despite 2 criminal convictions and despite the fact that criminal law is a seperate legislation from animal welfare legislation.
Marc Pareit was only convicted for refusing to return our Maya - he was NOT convicted for falsifying her registration in dogID as this was not the object of the prosecutor's plea. This is however the object of animal welfare legislation - which is not applied in Belgium. As dogID abuses happen almost daily, it would be too much work to rectify all false registrations ... so owners are sent to court and those who can't afford to go to court, loose their dog FOREVER.
Barry's case clearly brings to light that the animal welfare legislation IS effective (if not, Barry couldn't have been returned immediatly to its legitimate owner). Maya's case brings to light that the legislation is NOT applied in all cases. It shows that Belgian legislation applies to some people and dogs, but clearly not to all people and dogs.
Nor in Maya's, nor in Barry's case, the veterinary who executed the false registration was sanctioned. Nor were the people who ordered the false registrations. The law foresees a 1000 euro fine for falsely registering a dog in dogID, but again, it is not applied.
The difference between Maya and Barry ? Barry's owner was smart and went to the press immediately and got quite some media coverage. Dierenwelzijn couldn't permit itself yet another scandal and applied the law. If he wouldn't have done so, he would have had to go to court as well.
Bottom line : our Maya could have been returned to us at once by Dierenwelzijn, as proven by Barry's case.
The good news is, that the European Commission has announced it will investigate the Belgian situation. What applies to Belgium, applies also in other EU countries. I'm planning an update of my european report, which I will share with you once it's finalised.
For now and until there are effective controls and sanctions, the best advice remains : do not chip and register your dog, because it is this registration that allows thieves to falsely register your dog in their name. Thieves can not register your invoice or adoption contract in their name. Registering your dog clearly is a waste of money, because it offers no protection whatsoever : not in case of dog theft and not in case of loss, not even when your dog ends up in a shelter as happened to Barry.
If you live in Belgium or the Netherlands, you're welcome to share the legal information I have gathered so far on www.gestolenhond.be
Many greetings,
Maya's mum Anke & Maya's sis Anaya