New York: USPS again stops mail service due to pit bull attack

NEW YORK -- Mail in one Niagara Falls neighborhood has been temporarily suspended, following a reported dog attack on a postal worker earlier this week.

The post office says that attack happened just this past Monday on Halloween, when a pit bull ran after the mailman and lunged at him.

The post office says that this letter carrier was not injured in the attack. That mailman says the attack happened on Devlin Ave. and that the pit bull was loose, ran after the postal worker and bit the bag he was carrying, there was a struggle, and the mailman had to fight the dog off.

The post office say the pit bull lives at a home on Frontier Ave. in Niagara Falls. 2 On Your Side went to that home and the owners of the dog were there.

"I'm just really mad at the accusations we're being accused of my dog he's not vicious," said Daniel Currie, one of the dog's owners, "first off my dog is very shy, for him to play tug of war with anything especially with someone he does know that's just false it's not true."

He completely denies the incident occurred. The dog's owner says his pit bull "Buddy" was inside the house all day this past Monday.

And that, another dog in the neighborhood must've attacked the mailman.

But, a spokesperson for the post office says letter carriers have seen the pit bull loose, roaming outside the house before and that Monday was the first time the dog ran after a postal worker.

The post office has decided to temporarily suspend mail service to residents on four blocks here on Devlin Ave. and Frontier Ave. until letter carriers feel safe in this neighborhood. Residents here haven't gotten their mail for three days.

The post office sent a letter to about 70 addresses -- informing residents mail delivery would be halted. But those letters, never got to residents because service had already been suspended.

It wasn't until some people went to the post office, inquiring about their mail, that they learned about the reported dog attack.

REPORTER: What do you hope if anything, comes of all this?

"That we get our mail back and that we get a letter from the post office for the inconvenience for all this hostility that was created," Currie said.

So when can people expect to start getting their mail?

That's really unclear the post office says it's monitoring the situation. For now, residents may have to go to the post office to get their mail.

(WGRZ - Nov 4, 2016)