UNITED KINGDOM -- A Staffordshire bull terrier named Tyson has been destroyed after attacking two dogs and their owners
A terrier named Tyson ran amok attacking two dogs and their retired owners, killing one precious pet.
Lee Boville, 40, was looking after his cousin’s Staffordshire bull terrier when it escaped and attacked dogs walked by two retired women in Guisborough.
The first dog owner was screaming and terrified when the white bull terrier ran up and encircled her growling and baring its teeth at about 7.55am.
It pushed her over and bit the face of her 13-year-old Patterdale terrier Taz.
A passer-by kicked and grabbed the attacking dog until it let go and ran away on Prior Close, prosecutor Sue Jacobs told Teesside Crown Court yesterday .
Minutes later, Tyson fixed its mouth around the neck of a retired woman’s Papillon dog, Marco, on Westgate. When she tried to stop it, the terrier attacked her, biting her right arm.
Her dog died from the assault. Judge Simon Bourne-Arton QC said she still couldn’t begin to live comfortably without her cherished companion.
Boville, of Windmill Terrace, Stockton, realised his cousin’s dog was missing, went to look for it and heard screaming. He saw the first victim and apologised.
He admitted two counts of being in charge of a dog causing injury while dangerously out of control in a public place, from July 27 last year.
Tyson has since been destroyed. There had been no previous complaints.
Ian West, defending, said: “He’s absolutely mortified at what happened.”
He’d known Tyson for nine years, looked after it before, had never known it to behave aggressively and couldn’t understand why it did so on this occasion. He thinks Tyson left via a fire escape in a first floor flat while his back was turned as he helped his cousin fit a kitchen.
Judge Bourne-Arton, the Recorder of Middlesbrough, accepted that Boville did not know of the dog’s propensity to escape or attack.
“But you did not look after that dog with sufficient care, and that dog was dangerous,” he said.
“Two attacks, two people injured, and also one dog dead, as a result of essentially your carelessness.”
He gave Boville an 18-month community order with 120 hours’ unpaid work.
(Gazette Live - May 25, 2013)
