graduated from the University of Baltimore Law School in 1967. The two married in 1989. Starting in the mid-1990s, Noel and Knoller ran "their law office... out of a converted closet in their Pacific Heights apartment" in San Francisco.(p. 144) In 2000, Knoller and Noel "obtained their two Presa Canarios, named Bane and Hera, through their relationship with a pair of Pelican Bay State Prison inmates, Paul 'Cornfed' Schneider (whom they had legally adopted as their son), and Dale Bretches, both members of the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang." Knoller and Noel had first met Schneider at a trial.(p. 148) Bane was male and Hera female; by January 2001, "Bane weighed 140 pounds and Hera close to 100 pounds." Attack On January 26, 2001, while returning home with bags of groceries, Whipple was attacked by the two dogs in the hallway of her apartment building. Knoller was taking the dogs out of their apartment at the same time Whipple returned. The dogs escaped her control and attacked Whipple. The dogs' owner, Paul Schneider, was a high-ranking member of the prison gang the Aryan Brotherhood who was serving a life sentence in Pelican Bay State Prison. Schneider and his cellmate Dale Bretches were attempting to start an illegal Presa Canario dog-fighting business from prison. They initially asked acquaintances Janet Coumbs and Hard Times Kennel owner/breeder James Kolber of Akron, Ohio, to raise the dogs during their incarceration. Against Kolber's advice, Coumbs chained the dogs in a remote corner of the farm, which caused them to become even more aggressive. After Coumbs fell out of favor with Schneider, attorneys Noel and Knoller agreed to take possession of the dogs. They had become acquainted with Schneider while doing legal work for prisoners, and had adopted Schneider (then age 38) as their legal son a few days before the mauling. Bane, the larger of the dogs, weighed . Just prior to the attack, Knoller was taking the dogs up to the roof; Bane, and possibly role in the mauling has never been firmly Whipple in the hallway. Whipple suffered a total of 77 wounds to every part of her body except her scalp and bottoms of her feet. Another neighbor called 911 after hearing Whipple's screams. Whipple died hours later at San Francisco General Hospital from "loss of blood from multiple traumatic injuries (dog bite wounds)". Bane was euthanized immediately after the attack; Hera was