Dog Law?

Unfortunately the link to the Dogs Trust website doesn´t work so we can´t know what they say about legislation. From personal experience it seems that there is no consistency in police involvement in these cases. Any sensible person miught imagine that dogs which attack children (these cases always get maximum media coverage) do not have a spotless record. It´s almost certain that they have showed aggression previously but reporting aggressive behaviour will not result in any action. A friend who was recently very badly bitten by a dog while protecting his own dog (this particular dog had attacked his dog a few months previously and caused £400-worth of damage) was informed by the police that unless his dog had been on a lead at the time it could be construed that both dogs were "out of control" and the Crown Prosecution Service would not take on such a case because it represented a "your word against theirs" scenario which would be impossible to resolve. (I should mention that he had already reported the intial incident, so it was on record that this was a second incident, and that there were witnesses to the second incident, but that had no bearing, apparently). It would seem that children have to suffer before positive action is taken by the authorities.

Hi Claire I would think this is a police matter and the more people who complain the better its obviously the owners fault so maybe when he gets charged for his dogs behaviour he might keep it on a lead thats if he or she is allowed to keep the dog.

Thanks for your replies.

Hi Claire, I´m not a dog owner, so am not too familiar with the situation re. dog etiquette.

Have a look at the following link from the dogs trust. It looks like your next course of action might be to involve the Police.

I hope you´re not feeling too stressed over this situation. Good luck - Karin

http://www.dogstrust.org.uk/information/factsheets/doglaw/presentlaw/