 |
| Baby Jeremiah Eskew-Shahan and 120-pound pet dog named Onion. |
Yesterday I told the story of a Jack Russell terrier that bit a baby girl 30 times and ripped off her ear (since re-attached).
As I noted, there is no such thing as a "nanny dog" and anyone who uses those words to describe any dog, much less a Pit Bull, a molosser breed, a Dachshund, or a Jack Russell Terrier is a dangeous fool.
Today's example is the story of a cross between a molosser (a Mastiff) and a Rhodesian Ridgeback (a breed designed to face lions).
It seems this 120-pound dog killed a one-year old child on the little boy's birthday, but the dog has since been granted a reprieve because killing the child was deemed to be in "its nature."
From the Associated Press comes the story:
If a dog fatally mauls its owner's child, should the animal be killed or spared?
That's the question that will be debated in a Las Vegas courtroom after a southern Nevada toddler celebrating his first birthday was killed by a 6-year-old mastiff-Rhodesian ridgeback mix named Onion.
The boy's family voluntarily gave the animal up for euthanasia after the April 27 death of Jeremiah Eskew-Shahan. But the New York-based Lexus Project argues the animal should be sent to live at a sanctuary outside Denver because it didn't do anything wrong and was only following its nature.
Onion was slated to be killed on Tuesday, but an 11th hour court injunction on Monday delayed the death at least until a Friday hearing.
The boy's father, Christopher Shahan, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal the dog deserves to die. His son was at his grandmother's house in Henderson on his first birthday when he crawled to the sleeping dog and started petting him.
Officials said the 120-pound animal latched his jaws around the boy's head and began shaking him. The grandmother tried to pull the boy away. Other family members in the house rushed to help, but it was too late. The boy was flown to a hospital, where he was declared dead the next morning.
Rich Rosenthal, a New York-based lawyer who heads The Lexus Project, argued the child and his parents were at fault, not the dog, because the animal's nature is to attack if provoked while sleeping.
"I'm sure the parents are going through their own hell of how could we have let this happen, but killing the dog won't bring the child back," Rosenthal said. "Something grabbed the dog by the hair while it was sleeping and it reacted. In his mind, he didn't do anything other than what's normal for a dog to do."
- Related Post:
** There Are No "Nanny Dogs"
.
9 comments:
Wow, the owners of dangerous breeds want to have it "both ways"--whatever works in their interest at the time. After telling us since the 1970's that there are no "dangerous" breeds and that pit bulls, rotties, bully breeds, etc. are all saints/angels/nannies... suddenly they are claiming these breeds actually *DO* have an aggressive temperament? And as a way to SAVE the dog from euthanasia???
I don't excuse the parents for lack of supervision, but it's not like this is the first 1 year old to ever pet a sleeping dog while mom & dad watched TV. It probably happens thousands of times a day around the world. Most such kids get an air snap, nip or growl for their trouble--maximum a couple of punctures--but not instant death.
While I absolutely concur with you concerning the fact that there are no "nanny dogs" and it always worries me when parents make statements like "oh my dog would never hurt a child", I'm not sure they're completely wrong about the the dog. This wasn't a misdirected prey drive or a dog with no sense of boundaries. He was asleep, something startled him awake, and he reacted with a fight or flight instinct--being what he was--he fought. This is one of the one million and two reasons why parents should police all interactions between dogs and children--regardless of the size. The dog doesn't "deserve" to die--he didn't stalk the child. But to be completely honest, I'd probably euthanize him anyway. I don't know how you couldn't.
What a terrible, terrible tragedy.
I agree with Mary. I would have the dog euthanized. With the overpopulation of dogs, no reason to keep a potential baby-killer alive.
At the same time, I don't like to blame the dog. I hardly doubt the signs weren't there. Add on top that this dog was probably a "rescue" and may have had a troubled past. Then throw in a lack of exercise, you have a nice powder keg walking around your house.
A large part of what makes a dog a 'dog' and not a 'wolf' is the dog's tolerance of and ability to communicate with people. Are 'bully breeds' and protection dog types having that tolerance bred out of them? There are plenty of people across the country that would like to see all dogs banned; a much easier process if the idea is legally entrenched that 'dog nature' is 'naturally' to kill people.
Funny, this is why I don't like the idea of dangerous dog breeds. Most of the time, the human does something, the dog reacts like a dog, and the dog dies for it.
This would have been just as 'normal' a reaction from a collie or a terrier. If either of those was a good enough size, there could be a similar outcome. Personally I would euthanise any dog who broke the skin or did serious damage under those circumstances.
When you start tagging some breeds as 'dangerous' it implies others are safe, and then people will be less careful about letting the dog sleep peacefully.
Simba, Have you ever been around old school Lassie type collies? they have some size to them. Almost as big as a german shepherd.
Ever been around a standard bull terrier or an airedale? Both are good sized dogs. Bkurting out breeds or types does not change the fact that the ADULTS in charge dropped the ball. There is no way in hell I would leave any kid unsupervised with my dogs. I have a pit bull and an american bulldog, and they are both decent with kids. I don't trust either dog or child( espaecially child) to do what is right. At least when I train dogs properly, I know that 85-98 percent of the time, the dogs obey. Children as they are raised( or not raised) today tend to do the exact opposite of what is asked, usually with a minor disaster as a result. Having both dogs and children, you have to be incredibly responsible. Not only for yourself, but for dog, child and household harmony. I've not met too many adults that can handle that.
I know, that's why I said 'if', because there's a lot of variation in collie and terrier sizes: the 'either of those' was a reference to my (hypothetical) two individual dogs rather than the two types. I grew up around large terrier-mixes and collies of all sizes.
My point was the same as yours- the adults dropped the ball. Any dog can bite, no dog should be considered 'safe' enough to leave with unsupervised kids.
Normal domestic dogs (ones we have not selectively bred for abnormal, highly disinhibited aggressive behavior) use exactly as much aggression as is necessary to open up a flight route from a situation they dont' like. Assuming a normal dog was startled by the baby and had learned that startle was a sign of bad things happening, a normal domestic dog would, indeed, air snap, maybe do a reflexively pressureless grab (ABI), maybe accidentally superficially puncturing our delicate skin. Then a normal dog would stop a sec to see what we did, and if we backed off (or opened up a flight route), abscond without further aggression.
It is on the other hand normal ‘Power Dog’ behavior to suddenly go into a sustained attack, even after having let the family baby climb on him frequently before.
Re the silly idea that parental supervision would have prevented this case (and many other Power Dog attacks on children): This child did a thing it apparently had done many times before in the parents' presence. If the Power Dog had grabbed the baby's head, crushed its face, and shaken it one of those times, the results would have been the same. Being in the room wouldn't have made anyone quick enough to stop that first face-crushing bite. And don’t forget, once the parents did arrive, the Power Dog still didn't let go of the baby. That too would have been no different if the parents had been in the room when the attack started.
There’s no need to malign all domestic dogs in order to solve the child + Power Dog problem.
Please see also: http://blog.dogsbite.org/2012/01/saving-mans-best-friend.html
Sorry Sputnik, but it is NOT "normal ‘Power Dog’ behavior to suddenly go into a sustained attack, even after having let the family baby climb on him frequently before."
Not. No. Not. No. Not.
If it was, this country would be littered with dead babies. It's not.
This is not to say that I am a Pit Bull apologist. It IS to say, however, that I have a pretty good idea of what normal is, and one in 10,000 or less does not qualify. That's a freak occurence. Is it within the bounds of preventable and predictable? Sure -- same as having a hot iron over the bassinet, or an unfenced swimming pool.
But words mean something, and I do not want to "normalize" what is not normal, nor is it necessary to demonize Molosser dogs to make the point.
You are also assuming this was aggression. Why? I was not there, and you were not there. We don't know what it was.
As I noted only a few days earlier, with dogs there is also such a thing as prey drive and it has nothing to do with anger or aggression, but it has a lot to do with the kind of jerky movements and high-pitched sounds that can so often come from babies and small toddlers.
See >>http://terriermandotcom.blogspot.com/2012/05/there-are-no-nanny-dogs.html to read more about that.
Post a Comment