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CNN Live At Daybreak

Princess Anne Pleads Guilty in Dog Attacks

Aired November 21, 2002 - 06:12   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Queen Elizabeth's only daughter, Princess Anne, has pleaded guilty in court this morning, one of her dogs attacked two children back in July. Anne is the first member of the Royal Family in modern times to be convicted of a criminal offense.
CNN's Richard Quest joins us now from London.

And she did plead guilty. Was that a surprise?

RICHARD QUEST, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well certainly the nature of the law under which Princess Anne was charged meant there really was no other plea. Her -- there's no -- there was no dispute about the facts. The dog, who was called Dorothy (ph) or Dotty, and believe me, we've heard more than enough about Dotty in the last couple of hours, basically bit two children on a bicycle whilst in Windsor Great Park near Windsor Castle.

And what this case was all about and most of it was about -- because Princess Anne actually pleaded guilty. She said she was responsible. What this was all about was whether Dotty should be destroyed. Well I can tell you that Dotty lives for another day. We've heard a lot of evidence about how dangerous are bull terriers, the retraining that'll have to take place and in the end, the local magistrate here in southern England decided that Dotty could live on, although she's under a suspended -- this is the dog, by the way. Dotty is under a suspended sentence of destruction provided she's retrained.

As for Princess Anne, who, let's face it, was appearing in one of her mother's own courts, Princess Anne was fined somewhere over $1,500 -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Got you, and thanks for clarifying that Dotty was indeed the dog. So Princess Anne is going to have to fork over 1,500 bucks, which probably doesn't mean much to her.

QUEST: No, but she did get seven days to pay as is normal in these cases. And the other thing she's got to do, she's got to retrain Dotty. Dotty's got to be kept on a leash, but Dotty doesn't have to wear a muzzle. I promise you, Carol, we all know more about bull terriers than we ever wished to.

COSTELLO: Hey, remind us again, were the children terribly injured in the dog bit attack?

QUEST: No, I mean the serious point about this is that what happened was Dotty clearly didn't like children on bicycles or at least she wanted to play with children on bicycles. The children became frightened, they slipped off their bicycles and Dotty sort of grazed them. There was no allegation that Dotty actually was ferocious in terms of biting the children. This was the usual rough and tumble of a dog playing with children. The children panicked and that's how this whole thing came to court, but everybody seemed to accept that Dotty was not dangerous.

COSTELLO: OK, so well I guess we're happy for Dotty then.

Thank you, Richard Quest. We enjoyed your report as always.

QUEST: Thank you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired November 21, 2002 - 06:12   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Queen Elizabeth's only daughter, Princess Anne, has pleaded guilty in court this morning, one of her dogs attacked two children back in July. Anne is the first member of the Royal Family in modern times to be convicted of a criminal offense.
CNN's Richard Quest joins us now from London.

And she did plead guilty. Was that a surprise?

RICHARD QUEST, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well certainly the nature of the law under which Princess Anne was charged meant there really was no other plea. Her -- there's no -- there was no dispute about the facts. The dog, who was called Dorothy (ph) or Dotty, and believe me, we've heard more than enough about Dotty in the last couple of hours, basically bit two children on a bicycle whilst in Windsor Great Park near Windsor Castle.

And what this case was all about and most of it was about -- because Princess Anne actually pleaded guilty. She said she was responsible. What this was all about was whether Dotty should be destroyed. Well I can tell you that Dotty lives for another day. We've heard a lot of evidence about how dangerous are bull terriers, the retraining that'll have to take place and in the end, the local magistrate here in southern England decided that Dotty could live on, although she's under a suspended -- this is the dog, by the way. Dotty is under a suspended sentence of destruction provided she's retrained.

As for Princess Anne, who, let's face it, was appearing in one of her mother's own courts, Princess Anne was fined somewhere over $1,500 -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Got you, and thanks for clarifying that Dotty was indeed the dog. So Princess Anne is going to have to fork over 1,500 bucks, which probably doesn't mean much to her.

QUEST: No, but she did get seven days to pay as is normal in these cases. And the other thing she's got to do, she's got to retrain Dotty. Dotty's got to be kept on a leash, but Dotty doesn't have to wear a muzzle. I promise you, Carol, we all know more about bull terriers than we ever wished to.

COSTELLO: Hey, remind us again, were the children terribly injured in the dog bit attack?

QUEST: No, I mean the serious point about this is that what happened was Dotty clearly didn't like children on bicycles or at least she wanted to play with children on bicycles. The children became frightened, they slipped off their bicycles and Dotty sort of grazed them. There was no allegation that Dotty actually was ferocious in terms of biting the children. This was the usual rough and tumble of a dog playing with children. The children panicked and that's how this whole thing came to court, but everybody seemed to accept that Dotty was not dangerous.

COSTELLO: OK, so well I guess we're happy for Dotty then.

Thank you, Richard Quest. We enjoyed your report as always.

QUEST: Thank you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com