Articles Posted in Dog Bites

A 4-year-old boy suffered severe facial injuries in a Chester, California dog attack, after a neighbor’s dog bit him, the Chester Editor reports. Avery Stout was reportedly playing with his older brothers in the neighborhood the afternoon of Aug. 12 when the attack occurred. Avery’s father Dan Stout said he saw a huge cut on his son’s face and his lower lip looked “like it was hanging off, like it was chewed off and just hanging there.”

It took 60 stitches to close up that large cut, which began in the center of Avery’s nose, continued through his lips and ended with a small cut on his chin. The little boy is now facing plastic surgery. Not only that, because Avery’s lower lip had no blood circulation for a long period of time, surgeons may have to remove it.

Chester’s dad is unhappy with the county for not promptly sending out an animal control officer to take custody of the dangerous dog and with the dog owner for letting his dog roam the neighborhood without a leash. I absolutely support the father’s assertion that the county put the entire neighborhood in danger by not catching the dog in a timely manor. Stout compares living with the fear of a dog attack to living in a neighborhood where drive-by shootings occur.
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A woman in Canyon Country suffered severe injuries after both she and her Chihuahua were attacked by two Pit-Bulls during a walk. According to an ABC News report, Tempo Edwards was walking her dog when two pit-bulls attacked her. Edwards reportedly suffered bite marks on her hand and neck. The district attorney is looking at filing criminal charges against a Canyon Country man believed to be the owner of the two Pit- Bulls.

The pit-bulls first went after Edward’s dog and then her. One of the dogs locked its jaw around her neck and knocked her down. Neighbor Lillie Troncale, who came to her rescue, managed to scare the dogs and get them off Edwards, who reportedly had undergone a kidney transplant recently. Her doctors are now concerned about possible infection from the pit-bull dog bites.

Thank goodness Troncale was near by and acted quickly. She probably saved Edward’s life. I wish Edwards a speedy recovery. I also hope the district attorney goes through with the prosecution of the dog owner.

According to statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, Pit Bulls and Rottweilers accounted for more than half the fatal dog attacks between 1977 and 1998. Over two thirds of the people I have represented in dog attack cases were bitten by either Pit Bulls or Rottweilers.
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Breshan Coburn, 9, of Corvallis, Oregon, suffered punctures and bruises to his arms and . stomach after being attacked and bitten by a loose pit bull at Heartland Humane Society’s animal shelter in Corvallis, according to this article in the Gazette-Times. Breshan was reportedly at the shelter with his parents, Penny and Kevin Coburn, when he suffered the dog bite attack when a pit bull-heeler mix bolted from his kennel and attacked the boy.

Breshan’s parents found out that the pit bull got away because the kennel’s gate was inoperable. . It didn’t have a functional latching mechanism. Kevin Coburn, who managed to pull the dog off his son and drag it back to its kennel, found that the U-shaped latch was bent and could not be closed.

It is unfortunate that Breshan suffered such a traumatic dog attack in a place where he went to adopt a dog. The Heartland Humane Society and employees are responsible for keeping the animals secured and visitors safe.. The Humane Society’s officials knew the dog might pose a danger due to its known history. That knowledge imposed upon them a higher duty to protect visitors to the animal shelter.
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A woman in Canyon Country suffered severe dog attack injuries after both she and her Chihuahua were attacked by two Pit-Bulls during a walk. According to an ABC News report, Tempo Edwards was walking her dog when two pit-bulls attacked her. Edwards reportedly suffered bite marks on her hand and neck. The district attorney is looking at filing criminal charges against a Canyon Country man believed to be the owner of the two Pit- Bulls.

The pit-bulls first went after Edward’s dog and then her. One of the dogs locked its jaw around her neck and knocked her down. Neighbor Lillie Troncale, who came to her rescue, managed to scare the dogs and get them off Edwards, who reportedly had undergone a kidney transplant recently. Her doctors are now concerned about possible infection from the dog bites.

Thank goodness Troncale was near by and acted quickly. She probably saved Edward’s life. I wish Edwards a speedy recovery. I also hope the district attorney goes through with the prosecution of the dog owner.

According to statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, Pit Bulls and Rottweilers accounted for more than half the fatal dog attacks between 1977 and 1998. Over two thirds of the people I have represented in dog attack cases were bitten by either Pit Bulls or Rottweilers.
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A 36-year-old female mail-carrier in Fresno was severely injured in a dog bite incident after she was attacked by a pack of four pit-bulls as she was delivering mail in the Mayfair area near McLane High School, according to an ABC news report. Luckily for the mail carrier neighbor Maria Nava intervened and warded off the attacking animals before the incident became deadly.

A related ABC news articlestates that these dogs had a history of violent attacks and neighbors said the animals should’ve been removed from their area well before this attack. These pit-bulls had already attacked other neighborhood pets as well as a partially blind 77-year-old woman and had not been rounded up as required by Tyler’s Law. This law, named after a 6-year-old Fresno County boy mauled to death by dogs already deemed “vicious,” was designed to stop dogs from attacking more than once.

A report states that this most recent attack has now forced Fresno county officials to re-examine the way they are controlling or keeping tabs on vicious dogs. They are learning that one of the loopholes in Tyler’s Law was that officials required solid proof of dog attacks such as dates, times and videotape evidence, which some of these dog bite victims could not provide.
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Two Stockton animal control officers were bitten by a pit-bull that jumped out of the open window and attacked them even as they were investigating a report of the same dog attacking and biting a girl, the Stockton Record reports .

The unprovoked dog attack happened when the two county officers, who have not been identified, arrived at the home on the 200 block of South Walker Lane in unincorporated east Stockton. The California dog bite happened after the canine jumped out of an open window and attacked the workers causing deep puncture wounds in the arm and midsection of one of the officers. Ernest Molieri, manager at the San Joaquin County Animal Control Division called this the worst dog attack on county animal control officers in recent memory. Both officers were treated and released from a local hospital.

The San Joaquin County has begun proceedings to designate this pit-bull as a “dangerous dog” and it has been quarantined in the animal shelter as required by California law.
This pit-bull should clearly have been restrained by the dog’s owner. Both times, the dog jumped out of an open window and attacked its victims unprovoked.

Under Stockton’s “Vicious Dog Regulation Ordinance any dog which, when unprovoked, on two separate occasions within the prior thirty-six (36) month period, engages in any behavior that requires a defensive action by any person to prevent bodily injury … can be labeled as a potentially dangerous dog. This process includes a public hearing for evidence after which the city determines if a dog is dangerous. It’ll be interesting to know if the pit bull that attacked the Stockton animal control officers had been determined to be potentially dangerous by another jurisdiction. Then, owning or even keeping this dog in Stockton becomes illegal.
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People are not the only ones suffering serious dog bites and attacks these days. DogsBite.org, a dog attack victim’s support group has released a report titled Dog Attacks on Livestock and Horses January – May 2008. The report is very timely and highlights a less discussed aspect of our nation’s growing dog bite problem – the damage caused by dog attacks on livestock and horses.

Roaming dogs can cause extensive losses to livestock owner. But, according to the report it is specific breeds of dogs – the “fighting” pure or combination bred American pit bull terrier, Staffordshire bull terrier, American Staffordshire terrier, bull terrier, that present the biggest danger to livestock. The qualities of tenacity and refusal to back down coupled with natural aggression and physical strength of these breeds inflicts a significant toll on livestock, according to the article.

Livestock are often caught in their enclosures during attacks and a single pit bull type dog becomes as dangerous as a pack because it will eventually attack every member of an entire herd, including larger animals. The cost to the livestock owners can be devastating.
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Sheri Moody, the 54-year-old Orange County woman whose pit-bull bit and seriously injured a mailman, will face the lesser charge of a misdemeanor instead of a felony in the Westminster dog bite case, The Orange County Register reports .

David Carroll, a longtime mail carrier was mauled in September 2007 by Moody’s pit-bull, Maggie who had gotten out of Moody’s home in a Westminster neighborhood. In spite of his efforts to fight off the pit-bull, David, who is our client, suffered horrific bites, bruises and cuts on his face that needed numerous stitches. Deputy District Attorney Raymund Diaz filed a felony charge against Moody for allowing Maggie to cause serious injury.

Orange County Superior Court Judge John Nho Trong recently lowered the charges saying he was not satisfied with the evidence in the case and that the Westminster Animal Control should have cited Moody more often. Moody now faces only a year in jail.

Under California Civil Code section 3342 a dog owner is strictly liable for injuries inflicted by his dog upon a person, even if the owner was not negligent and the dog had never bitten anyone before, as long as the person who was bitten had the legal right to be where he was attacked.

There is evidence that Moody had more than one dog that had behaved dangerously and that the Westminster Animal Control knew this. Had Animal Control followed by the procedures established by the “vicious dog statute,” Maggie might not have been able to attack Carroll, and he would not have suffered the crippling injuries which continue to plague him.
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Tyrone Yates, an Ohio State Representative has introduced a bill that calls for a statewide ban on the pit bull breed, according to a recent report posted on Local12.com.

The change proposed to Ohio’s current vicious dog law would ban the ownership of a pit bull and require the dog warden to collect and euthanize any canines of this breed. A history of dog bite attacks involving pit bulls including a recent unprovoked attack by a family pit bull pet that ripped into a 12-year-old boy leaving bites to his feet, back, arms and legs prompted Yates to take action. Animal rights activists counter the bill saying the problem lies with the pit bull owners who train them to be violent. Yates recognizes the moral issues inherent to destroying a breed but is driven by his duty to public safety and is determined to keep these dogs off the street. If the bill doesn’t pass this time, Yates is determined to reintroduce it next year.
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Sonia Perez, 28, a Houston letter carrier was attacked and bitten badly by a Rottweiler last weekend, according to The Houston Chronicle.

The brief dog bite attack lasted only a few minutes but did enough injury to Perez to put her in the hospital with puncture wounds. The viciousness of the attack surprised even the experienced letter carrier causing her to forget her training in such a situation and use her Mace, said the news article.

I’m truly sorry for the injury suffered by Perez in this brutal and unprovoked attack and wish her a complete recovery. Postal employees across the country are always on the front line in dog attacks and Houston has earned itself the dubious honor of having the most dog attacks against letter carriers. California cities Santa Ana and Sacramento follow closely in the next two places.

California however has the most number of fatalities in dog attacks. Violent dog bite attacks can cause immediate and painful injuries as well as long-term damages including emotional scarring. Among the estimated annual 4.7 million-dog bite victims postal worker, children and the elderly are typically the ones who suffer the most. Additional studies also show this problem is getting worse.
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