Suit Centers on Refusal to Admit Man, Dog

Sy Elliott clearly has an agenda as the founder of an organization that certifies service dogs for heart patients. He also relies on one himself. That would be his toy poodle, Messy Jessie, who faithfully carries Elliott’s heart medication attached to his collar.

So when he and his poodle were turned away by a Mission Viejo restaurant, Elliott decided to turn his umbrage into a lawsuit he filed earlier this week against the restaurant and an Orange County sheriff’s deputy, demanding that four-legged servants like Jessie be recognized, much like guide dogs are for the blind.

“Ultimately this is about disabled people being able to function in society,” said Elliott’s lawyer, Stephen K. Leathers. But the restaurant owner on the receiving end of the lawsuit has a different view of the legal question.

“It’s a scam,” said Wray Crawford, owner of the Wings Restaurant. “The whole thing is ridiculous. He’s just trying to create business; there’s no violation here.”

Legal experts aren’t so sure, however, and that’s why Elliott and Leathers believe they have a case. At issue is a sometimes gray area of the federal law, the Americans With Disabilities Act, which requires business establishments to admit dogs that service disabled people yet does not define just what that means.

“To the extent that the law doesn’t specifically define a ‘service animal,’ ” said Liz Savage, a lawyer for the U.S. Department of Justice, “it’s a matter that can be litigated.”

But Mark Kelman, a law professor at Stanford University, said he doubts Elliott can win his case. The purpose of the Americans With Disabilities Act, Kelman said, is to break down barriers that prevent disabled people from participating in public life. The professor said he believes Elliott must prove he cannot take his pills without the dog.

There is no single outlet for information about service dogs in the United States. But according to the people who train and certify service dogs, there are thousands across the country.

Since 1975, according to Clark Pappas, program director for Canine Companions for Independence--the country’s largest provider of service dogs for disabled people other than the blind--his Santa Rosa-based nonprofit group has provided more than 1,600 trained service dogs.

Among other things, he said, service animals help their masters by retrieving dropped items, turning light switches on and off, opening refrigerators and mail boxes, pulling wheelchairs, fetching telephones and reacting to sounds such as doorbells, smoke alarms and specific commands.

While he has not heard of dogs used to carry medications for heart patients, Pappas said: “I would not want to make a judgment call without knowing more.”

Some dog experts are skeptical.

“Basically, the guy is saying he’s using the dog to augment his memory,” said Mike Roche, past president of Assistance Dogs International in Lakewood, Colo. “We don’t have dogs that augment memory work.”

Messy Jessie’s brush with the law came Dec. 10, 1997, when Elliott and his poodle arrived at Crawford’s steak-and-seafood restaurant. Told that he would not be served with a dog in tow, Elliott explained that he is disabled by a severe heart condition and relies on the dog, who is trained to bring him his heart pills in case he falls ill.

Crawford, however, recalls events differently.

“This guy comes into my restaurant and demands to be seated immediately with a smelly, filthy poodle that looked like it hadn’t been washed in six or seven months,” Crawford said. “You could tell that it wasn’t a trained service dog.”

When Elliott wouldn’t leave, Crawford summoned two sheriff’s deputies who ordered him out, according to the lawsuit. Hector Rivera, a sheriff’s spokesman, declined to comment.

Elliott is founder of Heart Therapy Dogs International, a nonprofit Laguna Hills organization that certifies service dogs, including Messy Jessie, according to his attorney.

Elliott declined to comment on the lawsuit or his work, but explained that he recently underwent quadruple bypass surgery, and relies on his poodle to carry nitroglycerin pills--used to help stimulate failing hearts--in a stainless steel container attached to his collar.

Asked why he can’t carry his own pills, Elliott said Messy Jessie’s assistance means the medication will never be forgotten when they go out. Elliott said the dog is also trained to bring the pills within reach if an emergency arises. And the dog has done it before, Elliott said.

“My dog saved my life,” says Elliott, recalling one incident when he said he was experiencing a heart attack and the dog came to the rescue. “He jumped on the bed and put [the medicine] in a place where I could get it.”