Life next to a killer
Dog that mauled beloved Bailey still a neighbour
A DISTRAUGHT woman says she is forced to live next door to the dog that killed her pet because the council refuses to relocate it.
Penny Daniels’ maltese shih tzu was attacked and killed by her neighbour’s dog last month.
Her Arundel neighbour was fined and the dog declared dangerous following a Gold Coast City Council investigation.
This means the dog won’t be euthanised or relocated.
Ms Daniels broke down in tears several times while she recalled the horrific encounter that also left her hospitalised for several days.
She said she had taken her dog Bailey on his usual walk around the neighbourhood. They had reached the end of their street and were approaching a friend’s driveway when she saw the neighbour’s dog “running down the road towards us at full pelt”.
It is understood the neighbour’s dog had escaped
from the property.
Ms Daniels picked up Bailey and tried to get away, but the neighbour’s dog knocked her over and attacked them both.
“I was screaming before it even got there because I knew I had no opportunity to stop it,” she said. “I was just hoping someone would hear and come out.
“(The dog) was jumping all over me and biting me and I was trying to fight him off. I knew already he had bitten (Bailey) so badly that there was nothing I could do.”
A couple driving past scared the dog away and drove Ms Daniels and Bailey to the vet, where he died from his injuries.
Ms Daniels was in hospital for three days after suffering deep puncture wounds that required surgery.
Following an investigation, a council spokeswoman said the dog had been returned to its owner.
“City of Gold Coast confirms the dog has been declared dangerous and the
owner will be required to comply with the conditions for keeping a regulated dangerous dog,” she said.
“An inspection of the dog’s enclosure has been completed and city officers have determined it complies with the conditions of keeping a dangerous dog.
“If your dog is regulated it must be desexed, wear a reflective yellow-and-redstriped regulated dog collar, be muzzled and on a lead when in public, and be secured by an enclosure with a minimum height of 1.8 metres.”
However, Ms Daniels is devastated by the council’s decision not to euthanise or relocate the animal.
“If it’s not going to be put down it needs to go on a property somewhere where it can be of less risk,” she said.
“What is it going to take? For a child to get killed? For an old person to get killed?
“I want that dog out of here because I would feel personally responsible if I didn’t make that happen and someone else got hurt.”