Govind Tekale
A Belgian Malinois named Major is living on borrowed time in Austin. His owner has filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block the city from carrying out a euthanasia order. A federal judge has issued a reported temporary restraining order. But Major’s legal situation is more constrained than the petitions and social media campaigns surrounding it suggest.
Major came to the attention of Austin Animal Services following a March 31, 2025 incident involving a bite. A Travis County municipal court conducted a dangerous dog proceeding and ordered humane euthanasia. The case reached the Texas Supreme Court, which declined to revive the challenge to the euthanasia order. Owner Shane Lilly then filed a federal lawsuit, arguing that officials failed to properly consider Major’s alleged role as a service animal and raising disability-related claims, including arguments under the Americans with Disabilities Act. A federal judge issued a reported temporary restraining order, which bars Austin Animal Services from carrying out the euthanasia while federal courts assess the case. A federal hearing is expected in Austin this week.
For pet owners and municipalities across Texas, Major’s federal lawsuit tests the limits of city dangerous-dog ordinances in cases involving claimed service-animal status. The reported emergency order temporarily blocks Austin Animal Services from acting. A final ruling against the city could establish new procedural considerations before shelters carry out court-ordered euthanasias in service-animal cases.
What the Temporary Order Does and Doesn’t Do
A temporary restraining order is not an acquittal, a reversal of the dangerous dog finding, or a path home for Major. It is a procedural pause while a federal court considers threshold questions about the case.
Lilly’s federal claims include disability-related arguments and assertions about Major’s service-animal status. The complaint’s requested remedies — including what alternative to euthanasia is being sought — are the controlling legal document on what the lawsuit actually asks for. Shane Lilly’s lawsuit argues that the municipal dangerous dog hearing failed to adequately account for Major’s service-animal role. According to reporting, the lawsuit seeks alternatives to euthanasia rather than return of Major to domestic pet custody. That distinction matters: even a favorable outcome for Lilly may not place Major back in domestic pet ownership.
Whether a municipal court’s dangerous dog proceeding adequately considered federal disability law and ADA service-animal protections is the legal question at stake in the federal suit. It is also an unsettled question in Texas federal jurisprudence. Most dangerous dog cases do not reach federal courts. They end at the state court level, as Major’s did before this filing. If the federal district court finds that the disability-law and service-animal arguments have merit, Major’s case could establish a precedent requiring additional procedural steps in service-animal cases before shelters execute court-mandated euthanasias in Texas.
Online petitions demanding that Major be returned to his owner describe a resolution that the legal proceedings may not offer. A federal judge issued a reported temporary restraining order halting Major’s euthanasia by Austin Animal Services. The order pauses enforcement while federal courts assess whether the municipal court’s dangerous dog proceedings properly accounted for disability-law and service-animal considerations under federal law. The federal hearing in Austin this week is the next decision point and will clarify whether the federal court intends to take the case or defer to the already-adjudicated Texas proceedings.
