Coyote debate turns personal

Josh Kleinbaum

Twenty-three years after a coyote killed her daughter, Cathy Keen

thought she had put the animals behind her.

In 1981, a coyote mauled her 3-year-old daughter in the frontyard

of Keen’s northeast Glendale home, thrusting Keen into the middle of

a debate over how the city deals with coyotes. As the issue

resurfaces -- the city last month increased its funding for trapping

problem coyotes from $12,000 to $24,000 per year, drawing the ire of

animal activists -- Keen wanted to stay out of the debate.

“I decided this time, I’m not going to go there any more,” Keen

said. “It’s too hard for me. I respect the City Council’s authority

to do what they think is in the best interest of the city.”

Coyote activists, who protested outside City Hall before Tuesday

night’s council meeting, dragged Keen back into the debate, and might

have cost themselves credibility with the City Council in the

process.

While appealing to the council to consider more education and no

trapping, one activist suggested that Kelly Lynn Keen, Cathy’s

daughter, died from child abuse, not a coyote attack.

“Over 24 years ago, the child you talked about, in an unsupervised

area, was allegedly killed by a coyote,” Pamelyn Ferdin said to the

council. “The child had a ruptured spleen, from the medical records.

That comes from blunt trauma. Blunt trauma comes from a beating, not

a bite to the spleen.”

Keen, who was watching the televised meeting at home, had heard

enough. She drove to City Hall -- with Kelly Lynn’s death certificate

-- to refute the allegations, delivering an emotional five-minute

speech. Kelly Lynn’s cause of death is listed as multiple wounds from

a coyote mauling.

“My heart is pounding,” Keen said. “I cannot believe someone would

accuse my husband or me of child abuse. I am president of Glendale

Healthy Kids. I have spent my life as a child advocate. I loved that

child with all of my heart and soul.

“I did not leave a child unattended in my front lawn. I put her

hair in ponytails, I fed her breakfast. We were off to Glenoaks Park

for tot time. I was brushing [Kelly’s sister] Karen’s hair. A coyote

came into our driveway and attacked [Kelly] in our driveway, 20 feet

from our front door, and dragged her across the street. My husband

saw the open door and ran to her rescue. He chased off the coyote.

“We drove as fast as we could to Glendale Adventist [Medical

Center], ran red lights, and did everything we could to save her

life. She was in surgery for four hours. She died from injuries

because of the coyote attack. I have the death certificate in my

hands.”

Keen said she plans to sue Ferdin for slander. Ferdin did not

respond Wednesday to e-mails seeking comment.

By making the accusation, Ferdin appears to have hurt the coyote

activists’ cause.

“I think that was completely irresponsible on their part, and it

showed a lack of respect to the community, the parents and the child

that was killed,” Councilman Rafi Manoukian said. “I understand the

points that they are making, but certainly the individuals that made

those comments, they have completely lost credibility in my eyes.”

Said Mayor Bob Yousefian: “Shame on them. Maybe the coyotes need

people who are a little more compassionate and more truthful to fight

on their behalf, because these guys definitely aren’t it.”

Coyote activists would like to see the city spend more on

education and not trap coyotes at all -- last month, the council

approved $4,000 each year for education. Because of a state law

prohibiting the release of predators, all trapped coyotes are

euthanized. Forty coyotes have been trapped since 2000.