A Villager is poised to escape prosecution after an alleged attack on a fellow dog owner at a dog park earlier this year in Florida’s Friendliest Hometown.
Kenneth Frischman Rudlin, 69, of the Village of Osceola Hills at Soaring Eagle, was arrested April 14 at the Atlas Canine Dog Park on Moyer Loop in the Village of Pine Ridge. He had faced a felony charge of battery on a person over the age of 65.
Another Villager had taken his two dogs to the dog park and one of his dogs took a ball from Rudlin’s dog, according to an arrest report from the Fruitland Park Police Department. The native New Yorker hit the other man’s dog with a two-foot long Chuck It ball launcher. The other man tried to break up the fight between the dogs when Rudlin “turned his attention to him” and began striking the other man with the ball launcher.
When officers responding to a 911 call arrived on the scene, they found that the Villager had three large welt marks on his back. They were “raised and swollen.”
Several witnesses provided statements to police.
Rudlin said he struck the man “out of instinct.”
The Chuck It ball launcher was seized as evidence.
In a deal reached last week in Lake County Court, Rudlin was allowed to enter into a pre-trial intervention program. Terms of the deal were not available, but such agreements typically call for the offender to enter into anger management training.
