Texas 4-year-old attacked by dog while at playground

TEXAS -- A Houston mother wants to make sure no other parent has to watch their child be attacked by a dog. It happened to her four-year-old daughter and it wasn't a stray dog. Someone let the dog run free.

The attack happened in the Quail Glen subdivision in far southwest Houston

 

 

 The little girl was playing with her two siblings on this playground when the attack happened early Saturday evening. Tonight her mom needs help finding the dog and its owner so he can be held accountable.

"It didn't warn her in anyway that it was in attack mode. It just leaped up to her face and scratched or bit under her eye from the corner of her eye to the end, and along her mouth across to her chin bone," said the mother, Tawana Barnes-Horn.

While her daughter ran home, she tells me the man she believes owns the dog ran off in the opposite direction.

"He never offered aid. He never came back to assist. He never came and gave his information. He fled the scene with the animals."

Barnes-Horn says while her family was outside the next day with their own pooch, they saw the pit bull with its owner again. And once again, the dog was not on a leash.

 

"As soon as my daughter saw him she tensed up and said 'mommy that's the dog that jumped on Leah.'"

They called the police and filed a report. HPD got animal control involved. Animal control was at the house when I arrived today and will be in the neighborhood looking for the dog and the owner.
Ashtyn Rivet with Houston BARC says this may be a violation of the city's leash law.

If your dog is not on a leash the dog can be impounded, and you could face criminal charges. 

(KTEK - Feb 17, 2015)