I thought long and hard before posting this, but I feel to be silent on this issue would be a serious affront to our sport. In my local field trial circuit several incidents that are unacceptable to our sport have occurred recently.
One handler verbal assaulted and abused two judges in separate incidents, pursuing one off the trial grounds to continue his assault. One well respected judge and club president received telephone threat on his life after a trial by a disgruntled handler. (The threat was recorded on an answer machine and turned over to local law enforcement agencies.)
More recently, a member of a trial committee verbally assaulted both the open and the armature judges and verbally abused a handler after being dropped from both stakes. This was witnessed by several that attended the trial.
I am not aware of any actions to sanction these bad elements by any of the offended clubs. This is wrong. The clubs and their trial committees have an obligation to the judges that give up their weekends, to the handlers that pay entry fees to enjoy a weekend competing at their events and the gallery who wishes to watch the competition without these ugly incidents.
To let these type offences to go unsanctioned is to indicate by inaction that it’s acceptable to act in this manner. Does anyone really want this type of behavior to become accepted at the sport we dedicate so much time, energy and other resources? I certainly do not and I urge all trail committees and participants that witness this type of behavior to pursue sanctioning the offending individual to conclusion.
We owe it to the good people in our sport and the spirit of good sportsmanship that must be the basis of any sporting event to kick out bullies, cheaters and bad sports. We cannot allow bad behavior to become accepted in our sport.
Richard Cheatham
One handler verbal assaulted and abused two judges in separate incidents, pursuing one off the trial grounds to continue his assault. One well respected judge and club president received telephone threat on his life after a trial by a disgruntled handler. (The threat was recorded on an answer machine and turned over to local law enforcement agencies.)
More recently, a member of a trial committee verbally assaulted both the open and the armature judges and verbally abused a handler after being dropped from both stakes. This was witnessed by several that attended the trial.
I am not aware of any actions to sanction these bad elements by any of the offended clubs. This is wrong. The clubs and their trial committees have an obligation to the judges that give up their weekends, to the handlers that pay entry fees to enjoy a weekend competing at their events and the gallery who wishes to watch the competition without these ugly incidents.
To let these type offences to go unsanctioned is to indicate by inaction that it’s acceptable to act in this manner. Does anyone really want this type of behavior to become accepted at the sport we dedicate so much time, energy and other resources? I certainly do not and I urge all trail committees and participants that witness this type of behavior to pursue sanctioning the offending individual to conclusion.
We owe it to the good people in our sport and the spirit of good sportsmanship that must be the basis of any sporting event to kick out bullies, cheaters and bad sports. We cannot allow bad behavior to become accepted in our sport.
Richard Cheatham
