accused of killing neighbor's chickens

DrDean said:

Something killed about 20 of my neighbor's chickens without eating them. Their property backs up to a state park. I have a ~35 pound 2-yr old mutt. He is very timid and I regularly leave him with my chickens all day, even for days at a time when I'm on travel (someone comes and feeds him over that time). He has never been aggressive toward my chickens. In fact, he will back away from food if a chicken wants it. The neighbor has other large foul that sometimes come into my yard, and my dog has not been aggressive toward them either. Some of my neighbor's mature roosters that were killed stood about as tall as my dog. My dog sometimes get out, and has gone into their front horse pasture. I've never known him to go to the back of their farm, where their barn is and chickens were. They have accused my dog of killing their chickens. They are very wealthy and have sent some of the dead chickens off to obtain DNA samples of whatever killed them, so that they can prosecute, yes prosecute, the owner of that dog. I'm not sure that my dog was even out that day. Plus, my dog was locked up with my chickens the entire day after the event, and my dog had no wounds or blood on him the evening of the attack. I don't have a lot of experience with dogs and chickens, but does it sound like my dog would have killed their chickens? They also said an animal attacked one of their horses earlier, and they indicated that they thought it may have also been my dog. No one actually saw my dog attack or be aggressive with ANY animals. Thanks!

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