Oreo was taken by Savannah-Chatham Animal Control officers after he bit a six-year-old in a West Chatham neighborhood.
"What made me change my mind is seeing my dog on Channel 11. My dog really didn't do anything. They were in his yard. They started playing with his food dish," Michael Wooten said.
But the six-year-old's grandmother is convinced the dog is vicious.
"That dog is not sweet at all. That dog is violent. And it has been like that ever since its been here," the grandmother Elizabeth Moxley.
The neighborhood is divided with different opinions about the American Bulldog, but his owners say they won't stop defending him.
"I was watching the girls and they told me they had to use the bathroom. They snuck out the back door. They know they did wrong. My daughter even says they did wrong. But anytime you touch a dog's food bowl, you are going to get bit," Patricia Wooten said.
Oreo's owners Michael and Patricia Wooten say he is a friendly part of their family. But the six-year-old's grandmother said there is no doubt the dog should not be allowed back.
"Half of the time you can't even leave your home when they let the dog out. The dogs will come after you when you are trying to go to work," Moxley said.
But Oreo's owners say the dog has never been a problem. One neighbor said he called the police on Oreo last year after the dog threatened his wife, but other neighbors were outside begging for Oreo to come home with Save Oreo shirts on.
"I'm fighting for him. There is no chance I'm going to let them put him to sleep," Patricia Wooten says.
But the girl's family says they will also continue their fight.
"I want this to stop and I don't want this dog back here because what happens if it kills a child," Moxley said.
Animal Control will have a dangerous dog hearing to decide if Oreo is vicious.
Family members say the little girl is healing and that she will return to school on Thursday.
(WTOC - Feb 3, 2012)
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