Time to tighten the leash on dog owners
The barest details of the story are the stuff of nightmares: a child in Little Norway Park near the waterfront on Saturday, approaching a playground, no doubt gleefully anticipating the fun of climbing and sliding, when suddenly a dog charges from the playground to attack.
The child wound up in the hospital suffering from “life-altering” injuries. The dog and its owner fled the scene, a maul-and-run. From a kids’ happiest place to a violent trauma in a matter of moments. Even if it were an unforeseeable accident, it would be horrific.
But it gets more disturbing from there.
After police apprehended those they allege were involved — seizing the dog and arresting a 38-year-old woman on a host of charges — the Star later learned the same woman, and the same dog, have a history.
Among the charges Monday was failure to “ensure dangerous dog is muzzled at all times when off the owner’s property,” a charge applying to dogs who have previously attacked.
On Tuesday, the Star obtained video of that previous attack. In it, Patrycja Siarek’s dog, an unleashed “American Pocket Bully” named Capo, charges onto an elevator and attacks another dog owner and her puppy.
The December 2021 case, which led to the dangerous dog order, is also detailed in court documents related to two lawsuits.
In a written judgment, Ontario Superior Court Justice Frederick L. Myers ordered the woman and her partner evicted from their condo, detailing multiple incidents of their pit bull-type dogs roaming the halls of a condo building unmuzzled and unattended, and of the owner having to physically restrain her dog as it lunged and attempted to attack other residents, including children. The dogs were seized, but then returned to the couple. One of the dog owners threatened the children of the sheriff who seized the dogs, and further threatened to get more dogs and let them loose in the condo building, according to the judge.
Myers called the dog owners “ungovernable.” He detailed their repeated refusal to take basic steps in response to official orders to keep people safe from their dogs.
Until recently, most of the information I have about the Little Norway attack and the charges laid were allegations by police, so far untested in court.
But on Tuesday, Siarek herself confirmed many of these details in person to a Star reporter.
In her own words, she described choosing to allow a dog she knew was dangerous, one that had attacked strangers before, to run offleash, unmuzzled in a playground, a place you would expect it to encounter defenceless children.
She explained she’d taken off Capo’s muzzle so that they could play fetch.
There have been several high-profile dog attacks in Toronto over the past year. Meanwhile, very many dog owners across the city seem to have, to a large degree, decided to collectively disregard leash rules in schoolyards, public parks, playgrounds and sidewalks. Every dog owner thinks their own beloved pet is harmless and ought to be exempt from the rules. Many may be right about the first part. But we keep getting violent, horrific, examples of how the reason we need rules is that dog owners are not reliable judges of the dangers posed by their pets.
City council issued new tighter restrictions on owners of designated dangerous dogs just last week. But Justice Myers’ judgment noted how effortlessly and persistently the owners disregarded all official attempts to apply restrictions to their dogs.
We have lots of rules, and maybe we need stronger ones. But if an owner is determined to break those rules — if, as appears likely in this case, someone is willing to recklessly put a dog they know is dangerous in situations where it is likely to attack small children — then something more is needed.
Real enforcement action is needed. That could start with simply enforcing the widely disregarded on-leash rules across the city. Such action might strike most dog owners as unfair. Tough — we have those rules for a reason.
And for those whose dogs do attack people, dangerous dog determinations need to come with actions that strictly enforce compliance or quickly seize the dogs in question. People who defy city and court orders about their dogs should not own dogs.
Confronted by a nightmare scenario in real life, many of us ask, “how could this happen?” In this case, it appears we’re getting a clear picture of how it is alleged to have happened. A dog owner seems to have set the stage for it to happen, again and again. And knowing that, authorities did nothing of consequence to stop it.
Real enforcement action could start with simply enforcing the widely disregarded on-leash rules across the city