A Propensity To Attack Other Dogs Means A Dog Is Dangerous To People

One of the things that makes a dog dangerous to people is its propensity to attack other dogs. The reason is that the owner of the victim dog is often nearby, either trying to pull the dog away, holding the dog, or breaking up the fight. It is natural for a human being to protect his or her pet. This is a normal human response to a dog fight — unless the person is a criminal who attends dog fights.

The limited data about dog-on-dog attacks suggests that they cause approximately one-third of the all serious dog mauling injuries suffered by Americans. Approximately one-third of the nearly 1,000 dog attack cases handled by Attorney Kenneth M. Phillips started with a dog-on-dog attack. Here are two examples from his files:

• A 14-year-old girl was walking her puppy in a small Texas town. Across the street, a pit bull in the fenced front yard spied the puppy. The pit jumped the fence and raced toward the girl and her pet. Seeing the pit coming, the girl picked up her puppy and held it over her head. The pit bull arrived and began biting the girl on her arms, legs and buttocks, which left her with ugly, permanent scars. The physical injuries and medical expenses resulted in a settlement of $100,000.00.
• An eye surgeon took his dog to a dog park. While there, his dog and another began to fight. The other dog was a mastiff; the doctor’s dog was a labrador. The mastiff grabbed the labrador by the throat and started shaking it. Neither the mastiff’s owner nor the doctor could make the mastiff let go. The doctor had a can of Mace in his pocket. He sprayed Mace into the eyes of the mastiff. It let go of the labrador’s throat and began biting the doctor on his hand. As a result of the injuries to his hand, the doctor finds it difficult to engage in his occupation as an eye surgeon who has to do microsurgery — a job that requires steady hands. The settlement was $50,000.00.

Merritt Clifton has compiled the only broad study of dog-on-dog attacks, and his figures reinforce Mr. Phillips’ findings: “a third of all disfiguring dog attacks over the years . . .  [happen when] trying to prevent a dog attack on another animal, most often a smaller dog.” (Merritt Clifton, Pit bull attacks on other pets lead to a third of disfiguring human bite injuries.) 

He adds, “In about 90% of those cases over the past dozen years,  the attacking dog was a pit bull.”

Therefore dogs that have the tendency to attack other dogs are an unpublicized danger worthy of further attention and study. For example, people need to know how to protect their dog (vigilance, keep it on a leash, be familiar with the other dogs in the neighborhood, etc.) and how to break up a dog fight without getting hurt (grabbing a dog by its legs rather than reaching into its mouth). The authorities need to study the issue further.

Pitbulls in particular

There is a side of this that is a perennial hot topic in the dog world: breed specific laws. It is a sad fact of life that the pit bull was created by mankind to kill other small animals. Like it or not, that is what the dog was bred for, and it remains the essence of the dog. Any one pit bull might be sweet to its owner, but is still “hard-wired” to kill other small animals. For that reason, pit bulls are dangerous to people because they have the in-born propensity to attack other people’s pets, which often results in a redirected attack against the other people, or a bite to another person.

Dogs that attack cats

Dogs that attack cats are also unreasonably dangerous. Despite what one will see on Looney Tunes, it is not natural for a dog to attack a cat. Dogs chase cats and anything else that moves — but do not normally catch them, kill them or eat them. When the cat stops running, turns around and hisses at the dog, the fun is over. A non-deranged dog will not commence fighting this fast, agile and determined creature with its 16 stilettoes and needle-sharp teeth. For more, see Merritt Clifton’s response to a comment dated April 6, 2016 at 7:16 PM. Any dog that lacks the sense to avoid fighting a cat is too risky and too dangerous to keep around people.