Given that the guy wasn’t a novice with dogs, it sounds like the shelter has a problem.
The article says the dog was adopted from an animal control facility. Those are not reputable animal shelters. Animal shelters thoroughly screen the animal they take in. Among other things, they test for temperament. Animal control facilities don’t bother with that. If you take in an animal from animal control, it’s buyer beware.
All the dogs we’ve had were adopted. All have had problems that were not disclosed to us, even though the dog was supposedly vetted by the SPCA and/or County Animal Control Services.
The only exception would be the 2 day old pup we took and raised on a bottle...she never figured out she was a dog and had no problems with people...other than to think she wasn’t a dog :).
As to the others we’ve adopted, one dog had severe food aggression, something you think would have been easily tested for...took us about 3 months to rehab him from that but not being prepared for it made the first couple feedings quite harrowing. Another we brought home and he bit 3 people in the first couple days we were home..this dog too responded quite quickly and was a great dog. Our latest guy we have is great dog...but he was so afraid, he would not go outside without us accompanying him...he was the quickest to come around and the skiddishness (not sure that’s a word) quite quickly began to dissipate.
As far as “trusting” our dogs who’ve been adopted as adult dogs...I never fully trust them with kids. We’re always near, when the opportunity arises and we have children in our home, especially toddlers. Their faces are right at dog level.