Posted on 01/31/2006 3:32:23 PM PST by iPod Shuffle
NBC10.com 3-Year-Old Critical After Being Mauled By Pit Bull
POSTED: 3:14 pm EST January 30, 2006 UPDATED: 9:07 am EST January 31, 2006
NEW CASTLE, Del. -- A 3-year-old girl remains in critical condition at Christiana Hospital.
Police said the incident happened on Oakmont Avenue at 10:30 a.m. in New Castle.
Police and paramedics responded after they received the report of a child who was attacked by a pit bull. When they arrived, they found Destiny Campbell suffering from massive head and shoulder injuries.
Police said the victim and her mother had driven to a home to pick up the child's grandmother. While inside the home, a dog, named Diamond, attacked the child. Police said that the attack was unprovoked.
A group of area residents responded to the calls for help from relatives and began beating the dog with sticks and broom handles.
The SPCA later responded to the scene and caught the dog, which had fled from the residents.
Witnesses said that the dog was generally peaceful and calmed down immediately after the attack.
"After this happened, the dog appeared to be polite. The tail was wagging. Even when the SPCA arrived and had to corral the dog with the lasso, the dog was still listening," said Trinidad Navarro, of the New Castle County Police Department.
The pit bull belonged to a family member, Turquoise Robinson. Police took her into custody on unrelated charges.
As she was being taken into custody on Monday afternoon, Robinson saw NBC 10 reporter Tim Furlong near a police car waiting to take her away.
"Why are they taking you away?" asked Furlong, as Robinson walked by.
Robinson then spit on the reporter as a cameraman taped the incident, and she responded, "that's why."
Police then charged Robinson with spitting on Furlong.
Robinson has not been charged in connection with the pit bull attack.
Wow, then... gotta hand it to the police for being proactive!
Dan
You never hear of cats doing this...
Doubtful. I was out of line of sight at their first encounter not to mention that I felt no more anxiety than usual when checking out dog-to-dog interactions at the park.
"We're working on the opposition parties to pledge a comprehensive approach to the problem of irresponsible owners of any breed."
That is the key I think. Once people are more informed they will realize what the real problem is. Give a few criminal or negligent owners a severe penalty and they will start getting the message.
Thanks for sticking up for the breed. Here is some more information if you are interested. A lot of the stuff people say is just sensational hype. The wikipedia article has some things I don't totally agree with, but they are pretty fair and point out that most experts don't approve of banning breeds. I don't recall exactly what breed you said you had, but all big dog breeds are the target of these BSL movements. They will start with pits and rotts and move on to GSD an others. That was the trend in Europe and in certain US areas.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pit_bulls
http://www.animalfarmfoundation.org/topic.php?id=4&topic=73
http://dogs.about.com/cs/breedprofiles/a/apbt_bsl.htm
perhaps your dog was just afraid. You certainly could be right though that this particular dog was giving off a vibe that was frightening your dog. Take a look at some of the links I posted if you are interested in learning about the breed.
Breed Descriptions
http://www.akc.org/breeds/american_staffordshire_terrier/index.cfm
http://www.ukcdogs.com/RegBreedGroups.htm
http://www.bulldogbreeds.com/americanpitbullterrier.html
AMERICAN PIT BULL TERRIER
Official U.K.C. Breed Standard
Revised October 21, 2004
History
Sometime during the nineteenth century, dog fanciers in England, Ireland, and Scotland began to experiment with crosses between Bulldogs and Terriers, looking for a dog that combined the gameness of the terrier with the strength and athleticism of the Bulldog. The result was a dog that embodied all of the virtues attributed to great warriors: strength, indomitable courage, and gentleness with loved ones. Immigrants brought these bull and terrier crosses to the United States. The American Pit Bull Terrier's many talents did not go unnoticed by farmers and ranchers who used their APBTs for protection, as catch dogs for semi-wild cattle and hogs, to hunt, to drive livestock, and as family companions. Today, the American Pit Bull Terrier continues to demonstrate its versatility, competing successfully in Obedience, Tracking, Agility, Protection, and Weight Pulls, as well as Conformation.
The United Kennel Club was the first registry to recognize the American Pit Bull Terrier. U.K.C. founder C. Z. Bennett assigned U.K.C. registration number 1 to his own APBT, Bennett's Ring in 1898.
General Appearance
The American Pit Bull Terrier is a medium-sized, solidly built, short-coated dog with smooth, well-defined musculature. This breed is both powerful and athletic. The body is just slightly longer than tall, but bitches may be somewhat longer in body than dogs. The length of the front leg (measured from point of elbow to the ground) is approximately equal to one-half of the dog's height at the withers. The head is of medium length, with a broad, flat skull, and a wide, deep muzzle. Ears are small to medium in size, high set, and may be natural or cropped. The relatively short tail is set low, thick at the base and tapers to a point. The American Pit Bull Terrier comes in all colors and color patterns. This breed combines strength and athleticism with grace and agility and should never appear bulky or muscle-bound or fine-boned and rangy.
Characteristics
The essential characteristics of the American Pit Bull Terrier are strength, confidence, and zest for life. This breed is eager to please and brimming over with enthusiasm. APBTs make excellent family companions and have always been noted for their love of children. Because most APBTs exhibit some level of dog aggression and because of its powerful physique, the APBT requires an owner who will carefully socialize and obedience train the dog. The breed's natural agility makes it one of the most capable canine climbers so good fencing is a must for this breed. The APBT is not the best choice for a guard dog since they are extremely friendly, even with strangers. Aggressive behavior toward humans is uncharacteristic of the breed and highly undesirable. This breed does very well in performance events because of its high level of intelligence and its willingness to work.
The American Pit Bull Terrier has always been capable of doing a wide variety of jobs so exaggerations or faults should be penalized in proportion to how much they interfere with the dog's versatility.
Head
The APBT head is unique and a key element of breed type. It is large and broad, giving the impression of great power, but it is not disproportionate to the size of the body. Viewed from the front, the head is shaped like a broad, blunt wedge. When viewed from the side, the skull and muzzle are parallel to one another and joined by a well defined, moderately deep stop. Supraorbital arches over the eyes are well defined but not pronounced. The head is well chiseled, blending strength, elegance, and character.
SKULL - The skull is large, flat or slightly rounded, deep, and broad between the ears. Viewed from the top, the skull tapers just slightly toward the stop. There is a deep median furrow that diminishes in depth from the stop to the occiput. Cheek muscles are prominent but free of wrinkles. When the dog is concentrating, wrinkles form on the forehead, which give the APBT his unique expression.
MUZZLE - The muzzle is broad and deep with a very slight taper from the stop to the nose, and a slight falling away under the eyes. The length of muzzle is shorter than the length of skull, with a ratio of approximately 2:3. The topline of the muzzle is straight. The lower jaw is well developed, wide and deep. Lips are clean and tight.
Faults: Snipey muzzle; flews; weak lower jaw.
TEETH - The American Pit Bull Terrier has a complete set of evenly spaced, white teeth meeting in a scissors bite.
Fault: Level bite.
Serious Faults: Undershot, or overshot bite; wry mouth; missing teeth (this does not apply to teeth that have been lost or removed by a veterinarian).
NOSE - The nose is large with wide, open nostrils. The nose may be any color.
EYES - Eyes are medium size, round to almond-shaped, and set well apart and low on the skull. All colors are equally acceptable except blue, which is a serious fault. Haw should not be visible.
Serious Faults: Bulging eyes; both eyes not matched in color; blue eyes.
EARS - Ears are high set and may be natural or cropped without preference. If natural, semi-prick or rose are preferred. Prick or flat, wide ears are not desired.
Neck
The neck is of moderate length and muscular. There is a slight arch at the crest. The neck widens gradually from where it joins the skull to where it blends into well laid-back shoulders. The skin on the neck is tight and without dewlap.
Faults: Neck too short and thick; thin or weak neck; ewe neck; dewlap.
Forequarters
The shoulder blades are long, wide, muscular, and well laid back. The upper arm is roughly equal in length to the shoulder blade and joins it at an apparent right angle.
The forelegs are strong and muscular. The elbows are set close to the body. Viewed from the front, the forelegs are set moderately wide apart and perpendicular to the ground. The pasterns are short, powerful, straight, and flexible. When viewed in profile, the pasterns are nearly erect.
Faults: Upright or loaded shoulders; elbows turned outward or tied-in; down at the pasterns; front legs bowed; wrists knuckled over; toeing in or out.
Body
The chest is deep, well filled in, and moderately wide with ample room for heart and lungs, but the chest should never be wider than it is deep. The forechest does not extend much beyond the point of shoulder. The ribs extend well back and are well sprung from the spine, then flattening to form a deep body extending to the elbows. The back is strong and firm. The topline inclines very slightly downward from the withers to a broad, muscular, level back. The loin is short, muscular and slightly arched to the top of the croup, but narrower than the rib cage and with a moderate tuck-up. The croup is slightly sloping downward.
The ONLY folks in my 'hood--downtown Lansing--who own pit bulls are criminals. Not a single family around here owns a pit--just the single guys who hang out on the street corners from 4pm until the wee hours of the morning, selling their dope, roping in johns for their "girls."
Detroit Animal Control has the right idea about how to deal with the breed. I sure wish Ingham County would take a page from their book.
The American Pit Bull Terrier is not a breed officially recognized by the AKC, unless something has changed within the last two weeks.
I didn't attack your character; I question your judgement.
You spit out a whole lot of information, ALL OF WHICH I've seen before.
Look, you're the one with the ticking time bomb in your house and yard. If you've got the resources to handle a lawsuit, or the steely-nerved ability to live with your dog killing somebody, that's your business.
As for me, I will work with anyone who wants to breed out of existence dogs who can kill with one snap of their powerful jaws, and often do.
See you too, in the next "Mauled by pit bull" news thread!
Yeah, it's their docility and apparent sweetness most of the time that makes them so dangerous. They definitely have a streak of insanity and who the heck knows when it will come out.
People who own them likewise have a streak of insanity.
More bad owners giving bad dogs a bad name.
What a cutie. G-d bless her and heal her.
So, a summary of your post would be that it isn't the dog's fault ("Almost all dogs involved in fatal attacks were the direct result of the dogs training")and pit bull owners shouldn't be blamed (" All the people who attacked the character of all pit bull owners are ignorant.") ?
Don't forget "oh the dog just wanted to play."
Hi sink, still walking your dogs off leash?
While I don't personally know any "pit bull" owners that fit that description I do recognize that it does happen and that it is a serious problem.
I would wish that those of you who only see that side of the issue would realize that there are many owners who don't fit that description and while we all want to get rid of irresponsible dog owners let's not do it by punishing the responsible owners.
Detroit Animal Control has the right idea about how to deal with the breed.
Detroit council backs off pit bull banFebruary 1, 2006
BY MARISOL BELLO
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITERIn the face of vociferous opposition from dozens of pit bull owners and animal activists from the city and metro area, the Detroit City Council on Tuesday backed off a proposed ban of pit bulls.
Instead, the council opted to form a task force to look for ways to strengthen the city's existing laws against so-called dangerous dogs.
The task force, made up of council members, dog advocates and victims of attacks, is set to meet sometime the first week of March.
During a more than two-hour hearing Tuesday, a standing-room-only crowd of irate pit bull lovers jammed the council's 13th-floor chamber in city hall. They defended their animals, saying the breed has a bad reputation because of irresponsible owners who raise and train the dogs to be aggressive.
"I think the proposed ban is a discriminatory way to handle dangerous dogs," said Mike Rafferty, a pit bull owner who said he would rather have moved than give up his dog.
Victims of dog attacks, however, were in favor of the ban.
Lloyd Wesley Jr., the U.S. postmaster in Detroit, told the council that he supported any measure that would reduce the number of dog attacks on postal workers. Forty-one Detroit letter carriers were bitten or attacked by dogs in 2005, compared with 32 in 2004, according to the U.S. Postal Service.
Under the proposed ordinance, any pit bull puppies older than 8 weeks would have had to be taken from the city or put to death, and permits would have been required for those traveling through the city with the dogs.
Current pit bull owners, who would have been grandfathered in under the proposed ban, would have needed to license their dogs, take out $100,000 worth of liability insurance for each dog and have the animal spayed or neutered.
Councilwoman JoAnn Watson, who introduced the proposed ban with former Councilwoman Sharon McPhail last year, said the heavy opposition caused her to look at other ways to enforce the city's existing dog laws.
Watson said the proposal was in response to complaints of stray dogs, particularly pit bulls, terrorizing neighborhoods and attacking residents. She said the attacks culminated with several high-profile incidents last year, including that of Detroiter Mary Stiles, who at 91 was fatally mauled by her bullmastiff.
"Something ought to be done," Watson said.
Watson's colleague, Sheila Cockrel, suggested the task force as an alternative.
"The issue of dangerous dogs in the city has been before the council several times over the last eight, nine, 10 years and it seems to have grown worse," she said. "But I don't think, and have never thought, that a breed ban is the answer."
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