Haley didn’t flinch when the hand of a murderer stretched out to touch her. The Great Dane/Siberian Husky mix just nuzzled in closer. For a time, Inmate #0492281 forgot that he was locked behind the steel doors of the North Carolina prison system. Michael Scott says it’s the best experience he’s had in the 17 years he’s been in prison (he’s serving a life sentence but will be eligible for parole after 20 years). Not that he deserves a good experience, the 35-year-old quickly adds with the guilt that comes from helping to take a man’s life. Still, the program titled “A New Leash on Life” brought him unbridled joy.

Since the program’s start in 2007, nearly 700 rescued dogs have joined inmates in select state prisons for eight weeks or more, learning basic obedience skills to improve their odds of adoption rather than destruction. In turn, the dogs breathe new life into tattered, tortured souls.

It was Henry, a Spaniel/Newfie mix, who comforted Elizabeth Byrd, a 46-year-old grandmother serving a ten-year sentence for killing a man. Henry barged right through Elizabeth’s pent-up frustration and anger.

“My mom and dad, when they first came to visit me up here after I was in the dog program, said there was a hundred percent difference in me,” says Elizabeth. “Henry was wonderful. He was the lovin’est, the easiest goin’ dog that you would encounter. He had the eyes—I said they were soul eyes because it was like you could see his soul.” Henry is now Benny to a Fairview family who was so grateful for Elizabeth’s work that they sent her a card from the dog along with a lock of his fur.

More than a dozen inmates of the Swannanoa Correctional Center for Women have experienced A New Leash on Life, and each, like Elizabeth, touts the benefits, saying the dogs shatter barriers between inmates and guards. Michael says he witnessed such transformations while at Mountain View Correctional Institution in Spruce Pine. Just a few days into Haley’s stay, he says men melted, dropping prison speak for baby talk.

“You got the guys who they think they’re all that. Let them dogs come around. Hard to act like a tough guy when they’re ‘coochy coochy coo.’” Haley softened him, too, offering unconditional love to a man who grew up in group homes, his addled mother often jailed. “If you think about it, for the first 14 years of my time, I just had to take care of me,” he says. Now he had Haley’s life in his hands. “It teaches you patience. It teaches you self-control. It teaches you discipline. It teaches you being reliable as a person, all of which I had none before I got locked up.”

Now in Woodfin’s Craggy Correctional Center, Michael hopes supporters are successful in raising the $6,000 needed to bring the dog program to that facility. There are more dogs to save, more souls to soothe.

“This is a penitentiary and people might walk around like they’re cool ... most of ‘em are scared,” says Michael. “Most of ‘em have got a lot of time. Most of ‘em realize they’re probably not gonna make it out of prison. And so, while they won’t admit it, them dogs serve a purpose. I believe they benefit the inmate almost as much as we can benefit them dogs.”

Want to help bring “A New Leash on Life” to Craggy Correctional Center? Contact Trina at Animal Haven of Asheville by visiting animalhaven.org. Tammy Jones is the morning show cohost at Mix 96.5 in Asheville.
(Photos: Left: Swannanoa inmate Karen Roper with Logan | Right: Swannanoa inmate Michelle Morrow with Biscuit)