WEST PALM BEACH — Circuit Judge John Hoy needed but one look at the two rows of well-coifed, fashion-label-wearing witnesses to know this was no ordinary 15-minute emergency injunction hearing.

Then again, the subject was Duke, a 65-pound Rhodesian Ridgeback-German shepherd mutt, and Duke is no ordinary dog.

Duke, who lives with his Harvard-trained physician owner above a Palm Beach hair salon, has earned island infamy for his attacks on Shih-Tzus, other small dogs and occasionally people.

Classified by county animal officials as dangerous, he was the subject of a dramatic town hearing last month leading to his banishment.

But he hasn't left, and for that reason his case crossed the water and landed in court this afternoon, in a hearing devoted to the question of whether Duke would be forced to leave town until his fate is decided in a yet-to-be-scheduled trial.

Hoy said yes.

Duke, whose owner already has faced $250-a-day fines for keeping him after the town's order, has until 5 p.m. Friday to get off the island. After that, owner Dr. Richard Lynn would be in contempt of court.

That decision followed a roughly 90-minute hearing in which exhibits included photos of Duke's victims as well his accessories - muzzle, choke chain and short leash - and Lynn's resume. The point of the latter, Lynn's attorney James Merola explained, was to show that the Phi Beta Kappa Cornell and Harvard graduate and recent president of the local chapter of the American College of Surgeons was competent to care for his dog.

The hearing also included stories from the victims' owners, who wept as they recalled Duke's attacks on their pets and described their subsequent terror at the sight or sound of Duke.

Vivian Dorris, whose beagle-basset hound mix Charlie needed three hours of surgery and more than $5,000 in veterinary bills following a June attack by Duke, described her dog's cringing fear now at the sound of a cat's meow.

"He just cried," she said.

Lynn, a vascular surgeon, scrutinized photos of Charlie's and other dogs' injuries and delivered the opinion they were not as bad as they looked.

But he said he had learned his lesson from the days when, after long hours at work, he walked all three of his dogs at once on long leashes while taking cell phone calls that distracted him from their reactions to other dogs.

Now, he said, he would apply the same attention to monitoring Duke as he had to the 980 carotid artery surgeries that he said he had performed "impeccably."

And he said Duke's record of four documented attacks should be put in perspective of the opportunities to attack he had passed up during six years of three to four walks a day.

"I've actually added it up," he said. "That's 8,760, quote, walks."

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