Police K-9 trainer denies injuring NJ woman’s dog, slams online attacks

OCEAN TOWNSHIP (Ocean) —A longtime dog trainer is denying a customer's claim that her dog was returned with feces on its fur and a serious eye injury.

Nicole Glidden said she left her 3-year-old miniature Pinscher named Otto at Sit Means Sit in the Waretown section of the township from Dec. 27 to Jan. 6. After her return, she found that Otto was covered in feces and had an eye sore. She also said the dog was less energetic than before the trip

Glidden posted her story on her Facebook page after getting what she called "all denials" from owner Bob Campanile, a retired K-9 officer. When contacted by New Jersey 101.5 this week, he declined to respond to the allegations and said he was planning to file a defamation lawsuit against the woman.

On Thursday, Companile posted a long response on the Sit Means Sit Facebook page, which said he was disgusted at the "libel onslaught" directed at his family by Glidden and others on Facebook.

Campanile said he provided the full vet report, which the woman had provided to police, to two other veterinarians who said the eye injury was consistent with a dog getting shampoo in its eyes.

"It burns and is very painful. This causes the dog to rub it’s eye and head vigorously with it’s paws and along the ground, carpeting etc," he wrote.

"To think that hundreds of people would take the word of one person, one side of a story and a partial vet report when they don’t even know what they are reading and spread something so terrible not to mention completely untrue, makes me lose all faith in humanity," Campanile wrote, adding that he never had a complaint his 20 years in the "dog business" and 25 years in law enforcement.

Campanile said Glidden contacted him 90 minutes after she picked up Otto about feces on his fur. Campanile said he checked his crate and found it clean. He thought they both dismissed it as "unexplained" until the next morning when his cell phone was full of texts and Facebook messages.

He said Glidden only shared a partial vet report that she said indicated that the dog had suffered a traumatic brain injury.

Glidden posted a response on her Facebook saying Campanile's post is "full of lies" and denies that shampoo gave Otto an ulcer.

"My vet feels it was trauma. She wrote in the report I showed and she wrote it in the second report I will share now at our follow up visit," Glidden wrote.

She also questioned how Campanile got Otto's medical record on a Sunday night, "two hours after I gave it to the police department he used to work at."

Contact reporter Dan Alexander at Dan.Alexander@townsquaremedia.com or via Twitter @DanAlexanderNJ