Del. Senate passes two bills to protect families and pets from domestic abuse
DOVER, Del. – The Delaware Senate has passed the first two pieces of a three-part legislation package that collectively seeks to weave animal welfare into the state’s existing protections against domestic violence.
The bills were introduced in March and build on a significant body of research that shows a link between animal cruelty and domestic violence against family members.
On Tuesday, the Senate passed Senate Bill 70, which would add several actions against a person’s companion animal or service animal to the definition of abuse of protection from abuse proceedings, including engaging in cruelty, inflicting physical injury, and engaging in a course of alarming or distressing conduct. SB 70 would also provide Family Court the authority to include provisions in a protection from abuse order that grants a petitioner exclusive care, custody, or control of a companion animal and order a petitioner to stay away from the companion animal.
The Senate also passed Senate Bill 71, to require law enforcement agencies, the Department of Services for Children, Youth and their Families, and the Department of Justice to report suspected animal cruelty to the Office of Animal Welfare that is discovered while performing their responsibilities in child welfare cases.
Both of these bills now head to the House for final consideration.
The third bill in the package, House Bill 95, would require Family Court to award possession and provide for the care of companion animals when dividing marital property after considering the wellbeing of the companion animal. The court would be allowed to consider each person’s ability to care for the animal, the pet’s attachment to each person, and how much time and effort each person spent tending to the animal’s needs. Under this bill, once a petition for divorce or annulment has been filed, a companion animal could not be transferred, concealed, disposed of, or spayed or neutered without the written agreement of both parties.
HB 95 is scheduled to be heard in the House Judiciary Committee on April 26th.
