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WASHINGTON - More than 50 highly trained and brutalised pit bulls which were seized from the "Bad Newz Kennels," of the American football star Michael Vick face the prospect of being put down if they are not claimed by their owners this week.
The animals were part of a dog fighting operation being run by the Atlanta Falcons quarterback on his 15-acre estate deep in rural Virginia.
They were in peak fighting condition and had already been entered more than two dozen fights with bets of up to US$13,000 ($18,000) a side.
Dog fighting has been deeply entrenched in the rural South of the United States for generations, but the involvement of one of America's most revered sportsmen in the blood sport has appalled many.
On Monday he is expected to plead guilty to dog fighting charges and be sentenced to between one and five years in jail.
Three of his co-defendants have already pleaded guilty.
The indictment of Michael Vick, 27, has been a boon to humane societies across America however.
For years they have been trying to tell the public of the horrors the animals go through.
'Its opened a curtain so everyone can see what's going on,' said Jeff Dorson of the Lousiana Humane Society.
'Dog men' as the breeders and fight organisers call themselves, operate an underground of secret networks, training their dogs for weeks before entering them in fights witnessed by no more than a few dozen spectators.
When the authorities raided Vicks's estate in April they found 66 dogs, training gear and numerous dog carcasses.
Typically pit bulls are put through weeks of cardiovascular training; some have their teeth sharpened by electric grinders while under sedation and their jaw muscles strengthened with 'bite-and-shake' exercises.
They are given daily workouts on treadmills and in swimming pools.
While in urban areas pit bull owners try to turn the animals vicious by whipping them, burning them with cigarettes and putting gunpowder and jalapeno peppers in their food, rural 'dog men' have their own code of practice.
Under the arcane rule of the bloodsport across the South, the dogs are trained to be human friendly so that the opposing side can handle and wash them before a fight.
This is in case an opponent's dog has been coated with poison or a sedative.
Animal-protection workers who have infiltrated dog-fighting rings say that owners often perform surgery on dogs that have been scarred in fights.
A pit bull in its prime with a strung of victories to its name can be worth more than $10,000.
On the other hand dogs that lose too many bouts are destroyed, sometimes humanely, but often with vengeance.
In the case, of Michael Vick's dogs, Judge Henry Hudson will make the final decision on their fate this week.
Vick, 27, intends to plead guilty to a federal charge of conspiracy to sponsor a dog in an animal-fighting venture.
Three of his associates said in a plea bargain that Vick provided all the gambling and operating funds for the Bad Newz Kennels enterprise.
They also said that he had executed at least eight underperforming dogs by drowning and hanging.
"There's no dispute over who owns the dogs," said Daphna Nachminovitch, a spokeswoman for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA).
"Obviously this is not going to be a process where someone steps forward and says, 'This is my dog, can I have her back, please?' 'These dogs are a ticking time bomb," she said.
"Rehabilitating fighting dogs is not in the cards. It's widely accepted that euthanasia is the most humane thing for them."
- INDEPENDENT
