Dog owner sent to prison for murder in 2001 mauling

A San Francisco Superior Court judge sentenced a woman to 15 years to life in prison on Monday for her role in an infamous fatal dog mauling.

The sentence came a month after the judge, Charlotte W. Woolard, reinstated a second-degree murder conviction against the woman, Marjorie Knoller, stemming from the 2001 attack that killed Knoller’s neighbor Diane Whipple. Whipple, a 33-year-old lacrosse coach, was attacked in the hallway of her building in January 2001 by Knoller’s two 120-pound dogs and bitten more than 75 times.

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Justin Sullivan/AP Photo

Hera, 2, a Mastiff-Canary Island mix, sits in a cage at the San Francisco Animal Control in this Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2001, file photo in San Francisco. The dogs owners, Marjorie Knoller, 45, and Robert Noel, 59, were then charged with involuntary manslaughter and keeping a mischievous dog that killed a human being. Knoller was also charged with second-degree murder Tuesday, March 27, 2001, in the death of Diane Whipple, 33, on Jan. 26. 2001.

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A second-degree murder conviction against Knoller was thrown out in 2002 by the original trial judge, who said the evidence did not support the charge. She was sentenced instead to four years in prison for involuntary manslaughter and released on parole in 2004.

But on Monday, Woolard, who took over the case earlier this year, imposed the new sentence, which was hailed by Kamala D. Harris, the San Francisco district attorney. “This defendant is now facing the appropriate punishment,” Harris said.

The mauling attracted widespread attention and was moved to Los Angeles in search of an unbiased jury.

Knoller asserted that she had tried to protect her neighbor from the dogs, a powerful breed called Presa Canario. But prosecutors convinced a jury that Knoller was both aware of the dogs’ violent potential and blithe to other people’s safety. Knoller’s husband, Robert Noel, who was not present at the attack, was also convicted of involuntary manslaughter.

Dennis Riordan, a lawyer for Knoller, said she would appeal the reinstated murder conviction. “In our view,” Riordan said, “the notion that she said, ‘Rather than staying home and cooking dinner, I’ll go out and possibly kill somebody,’ is unsupported by the evidence.”