philadelphia dog attack
Courtesy Facebook/Fox29

By Rob Fox

A pit bull and a bullmastiff, each about a hundred pounds in weight, were shot by police as they mauled a random 57-year-old man they had attacked on the streets of Philadelphia at 4:40 a.m. Monday morning. The bullmastiff was killed at the scene but the pit bull, which was also shot, escaped and has yet to be found.

The dog attack victim’s injuries were so severe that officers reported they could see bone through his multiple bite wounds. Responding police applied tourniquets to the man before he was taken to the hospital in serious condition.

At one point another person tried to help the man being attacked by beating the dogs with a cane, but one of the dogs chased him off. In the video the victim can be seen being dragged and tossed around by the dogs.

When police finally arrived they attempted to scare the dogs off before finally realizing that they were going to have to take more drastic measures.

The gunfire scared the pit bull off, but the bullmastiff was so focused on attacking the man that the initial shots didn’t stop it. The officers kept firing until the big dog finally went down.

This latest attack comes just a few days after a 9-year-old girl was killed by three pit bulls that escaped from her neighbor’s yard in Detroit.

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118 COMMENTS

  1. Pit bulls and bull dogs again, bully breeds, bred for aggression. Save that bad owners make bad dogs bullshit, when its the same breeds over and over, maybe its not the owners, but the breed. Even good owners get nutcase pitbulls. The bestest little angel until it chews someones face off.

    • It’s the owners. I have rescued many bully breed dogs. They are all aggressive and mean because tons of people buy them and abuse them. Mine even got out once or twice in my life and strangers found them when I was looking.

      Too many idiots either trying to treat them like people or abusing them.

      • My father in law was attacked by his labrador retriever hunting dog. Bit him in the face for no apparent reason. Dog was put down as that was not his first bite issue for no reason. Some dogs are raised wrong and some are just mental, just like people. Blaming a ‘breed’ of dogs shows vast ignorance and a simplistic approach to the situation brought on by low IQ.

        • So bred in dog traits are not factors at all? Don’t assume we are all as dishonest as you.

        • So predictable. The people that come on and state that a lab or golden can be just as unpredictable and dangerous as a pit bull. Go tell that to the guy in the video who had bone sticking threw his arms and legs. Pit bulls were bred for hundreds of years to brutally fight it out with another dog or beast and kill or die fighting to the end.
          Owners obviously play a role but don’t fool yourself into thinking a pitbull isn’t 60-90 pounds of muscle and teeth bred to kill. No comparison to most other dog breeds.

        • Sal and Joseph You guys have no idea what a working dog is then. Any dog that is bred to be strong, hard working and a tool is going to need lots of work and much time put into it. People who have these issues with these types of dogs. Working dog breeds can have major issues from trying to live a suburban life with little exercise or a job to do.

          I urge you to research taking care of working dogs. Not just bully breeds.

        • Pitbulls kill a shit pile of people. Don’t be dense. Anyone defending ultra aggressive breeds are doing a major disservice to everyone else. Same ignorance as anti-vaxxers. Facts > Feels. Ex-wife was a vet. Spent years in emergency vet medicine. Lots of shot pitbulls. Not many shot not-pitbulls. Facts > Feels.

        • DFW Patriot, you brought it up, so here is a response on the vax issue. There is only one measles vaccine available in the US right now due to a GOVERNMENT enforced monopoly. The same government threatening more gun control. It is improperly weakened causing the newly vaccinated to spread the disease. It only confers immunity for 2 years max. Measles is not generally a problem as long as you control the fever, which is easy with modern medicine. VACCINES HAVE BEEN LINKED TO AUTISM BUT YOU WILL NEVER SEE THAT IN ANY MAINSTREAM US PUBLICATION. The government stops people from suing vaccine makers. The government decides if a claim of vaccine harm is real and has secretly paid out billions of dollars from the government fund for that purpose. You know not to trust the government on guns. I suspect you know not to trust the government on many other issues. Why would you buy what they feed you on vaccines?

          In Europe and Canada parents can choose from many vaccines by many different makers. Why not in the US?

      • Biatec. I currently own a working line Airedale. (She was bred to hunt) I have owned Mastiffs and Airedales (as well as blue ticks) for most of my adult life. My sister breeds mastiffs and sells them across the nation to those who understand their original purpose. I have a good understanding of working line dogs.
        Some dogs were bred for certain things. People who only point to bad owners ignore the 600 pound gorilla in the room.

    • “when its the same breeds over and over, maybe its not the owners, but the breed”

      It’s both, really. Bad owners make bad dogs, and if it happens to be one of *these* breeds they maim people.

      Unfortunately, in my experience the people who make the worst pet owners are the ones who are the most fascinated by pit bulls, rottweilers, or other cheaply available attack breeds.

      • Eric in Oregon,

        I love dogs and I am extremely comfortable and confident around all breeds. And at least 6 different dogs have bit me (or tried unsuccessfully to bite me). Here are the breeds:
        — schnauzer terrier
        — westy terrier
        — rottweiler
        — Australian herding shepherd
        — German shepherd
        — yellow Labrador retriever

        There may even be more than that since I quickly compiled this list from memory. And this doesn’t even include the the additional times that dogs charged me and most likely would have bit me if I had not charged back and yelled and intimidated them to back off.

        As you can see, all breeds are prone to unprovoked biting/attacking.

        The main problem with some of the breeds is their propensity to maim/kill rather than deliver a single bite. In that regard, the problem breeds are dobermans, German shepherds, rottweilers, pit bulls, bull mastifs, etc.

        The solution is simple.
        (1) Make the following events the following felonies when dogs are outside and out of the owner’s control:
        — felony assault when their dogs charge people but do not bite.
        — felony aggravated assault when their dogs bite someone.
        — felony attempted murder when their dogs maim someone.
        — felony murder when their dogs kill someone.
        (2) Enable anyone to kill any dog that is not under the owners control and threatening anyone.

        Full disclosure: I have a pit bull that is extremely well behaved and is not a threat to anyone, even when she is not supervised. (We have trained her and tested her extensively.)

        • I also agree with the last bit, in principle.

          … but if a yellow lab tried to bite you, you almost certainly were the one that done goofed. 😀

    • Yup. And not just bred for aggression but bite and strength. I don’t care how vicious a poodle is, it’s not gonna kill a grown man.

      • Pitts have strong bites, but compared to a lot of other dogs they aren’t particularly impressive. I own several dogs with bites far more powerful than the Pitt, including number 1 on this list. A GSD’s bite is just as strong as the Pitt’s.
        The Poodle, by the way, is an outstanding dog. Have you ever seen one retrieve? Just great dogs.
        https://topdogtips.com/dogs-strongest-bite-force/

        • Got that right!!
          My 10 month old GSD has destroyed EVERY chew toy and dog proof ball.
          She now plays with a “horse” ball and has put hols in that!
          We also have an unlimited supply of shed antlers. Very good for her and a great chew toy.
          The larger the ridge or crest on the top of the head = strength of bite.

    • arc,

      You’ve presented a dilemma, and one not completely dissimilar to the one facing those who think all guns are bad. (No, I’m not comparing you to them, or calling you a gun grabber, or any of that nonsense.)

      There are at least tens of thousands, probably more, “pit bull breed” dogs in America, with almost as many owners. The vast, vast majority of these dogs and owners have never been, nor ever will be, any kind of threat to innocent life.

      If, as you say, the entire breed is a danger, what do you propose we do about it? And what do you propose to do about the small percentage of owners who are willing to fight or kill members of law enforcement to protect what they perceive is a family member? Remember, the majority of these people are law abiding citizens, who have never hurt anyone, with dogs who have also never hurt anyone.

      What do you propose to do about them?

      • “not completely dissimilar to the one facing those who think all guns are bad”

        With respect, the pit bull question IS completely dissimilar to the “guns bad” crowd, because the argument that these dogs are more dangerous is based on the fact that unlike guns these animals _can and do make their own choices_ about what they do and how much force to exert.

        • Read it again, and you will see I wasn’t comparing guns to dogs.
          The dilemma of what to do about it is what is similar.
          So I’ll ask you the same question I asked arc. What do you propose to do about it?

        • Ehhh yeah go ahead and re read mine, I know what you said and responded to it.

          As for the solution (not that I owed one), it’s always ‘more guns’.

        • Eric, I don’t understand your answer. Are you suggesting that we just shoot all the pitbulls or their owners?

        • Not intended to be taken entirely seriously, but yeah … more people should carry guns to shoot the dogs that need to be shot.

    • Google ‘pit bull kills baby’ brings up 4 or 5 cases in the last year alone! Now you tell me that it’s bad owners? No other dog breed kills infants in their cribs, FFS! I am not for a national ban on bully dogs, if local law permits you have a right to own a fricken tiger if you want to. Do the world a favor and ditch the white/black trash status symbol that are bully dogs and buy a tiger. Save em from extinction. I see pit bulls as just one more reason to CCW.

    • I was going to say the very same thing, but lo, and behold…. somebody else with some sense when it comes to these shit animals.

      100% agreed.

    • Semi auto rifles and pistols again, assault weapons, made for killing. Save that bad owners commit crimes bullshit, when its the same guns over and over, maybe its not the owners, but the guns. Even good owners get dangerous firearms. The bestest defensive gun until it blows someone’s face off in a school/church/Wal-Mart.

        • That’s true but a responsible owner doesn’t allow that kind of behavior and begins correcting it in puppies. They also don’t let their dogs run wild as the dogs in this video were. And the owners are legally responsible for unprovoked bites from their dog.

          The same way a responsible gun owner doesn’t just leave a loaded rifle in their front yard.

          The it’s really not a big difference.

          Besides, we’re not discussing dogs except in passing. We’re discussing what PEOPLE can and cannot OWN and doing that based solely on the percieved danger that the item in question presents. In that regard this is not different.

          We’re already fending off the antis on gun licensing and registration because cars. You want to start fending off the antis even more on flat out bans because dogs? I don’t.

          Are guns and cars the same? No. Can we have a nuanced discussion on this board, let alone with the general public? No. Is the other side arguing in good faith? No. Is handing them another issue to conflate and thereby attack us a good idea? No.

    • Yeah just like how every mass shooting it’s always an AR. Clearly it’s the gun. Must be banned from all these nutcase gun owners.

    • It is the owners. They happen to pick the same breeds because they are physically powerful dogs. To blame the breed just shows your ignorance. Any dog that has been raised wrong or mistreated can become aggressive, but when a dachshund attacks you are unlikely to hear about it.

    • Between 1999-2016 only 553 people in the US were killed by dogs according to the CDC’s compressed mortality data. The actual measuring metric states “W54 (Bitten or struck by dog)”. Of those 39% were aged 0-9 and almost 50% were aged 45-85+.

      Most dog “breed” stats are gathered from news reports scoured over the internet or local news papers but as we on this site know, the media isn’t biased at all about anything. Which brings me to this just for kicks. During that same time period (1999-2016) a total of 572,537 people were killed by firearms. This includes legal intervention, assaults, suicide, etc..

      So if we are going to ban a breed of dog for news reported rates of attack because they are “bred to kill.” We should also ban assault rifles because they are reported in the media as extremely dangerous and only “designed to kill.” 😉

      Raw mortality data can be found here, as mentioned in a post some time ago on this very site.
      https://wonder.cdc.gov/mortSQL.html

    • I have had 2 Pits, And both were sweet and would not hurt anyone (I even think they would have tried to friend someone breaking in) It’s NOT the dog for the most part, Yes there are bad ones (like people) but you will not find a more loyal any where

    • Rad Man, these breeds, pit bulls, chows etc were breed for violence that’s a fact it’s not coincidence to think it is is a dishonesty to yourself and others. I say this having owned pits that were wusses but that doesn’t make me blind

      • Humans more well adapted at violence procreated more often making humans bred for violence as well. It’s not a overwhelming factor in future offspring’s behavior. Psychiatric and medical issues aside, violent dogs are either trained poorly or misunderstood and have complex fear issues. Wild dogs roaming the street can do harm regardless of breed and there are many examples of this.

  3. Show this to people who don’t carry, if this doesn’t make you realize the dice rolled in life what will

    • Always carried while hiking back when I lived near Philly. Gotta love the city residents dumping their unruly land sharks when they got tired/scared of the beasts.

  4. People often give law enforcement a hard time for shooting dogs. Before they get started, let me ask a question. If it was your loved one being mauled would you have them distract the dog with a treat? The one time I had to do it I would have rather shot the owner. Not the dog’s fault. The owner had turned the animal out on me. BTW, I was there because the dog had already mauled three children, disfiguring one’s face.

    • Only time I saw an injury involving degloving was Pitt related. Sucks you had to shoot a dog but you HAD to shoot the dog.

  5. I grew up with bully breed dogs. They are amazing dogs. People who don’t know anything about dogs get them because they are tree huggery types and want to help. (or ghetto and think it will make them cool)

    I knew someone who rescued a pitbull. I said oh thats awesome I love those. Guess what she knew nothing about dogs.

    She left it alone while at work and it attacked her other dog. I said you need to do some training. She asked what I do. There are several different things that can work out or at least help.

    I liked muzzle training a lot. My dogs would be muzzled while I was not home. they could drink water through it. When I got home I would take it off. Eventually I didn’t need the muzzle. Kennel training can be good too.

    She thought it was inhumane and it eventually killed her dog. Then she put the pitbull down. I don’t ever wanna hear from her again.

    I am no expert. I am sure there are better qualified people than me on here there are probably ways people like more. Muzzle training and kennels worked well for me. This article just made me think of that. People who can’t handle these dogs either abuse them or neglect them and then the dog is blamed.

  6. None of my guns “goes off” by itself.
    The couple of dogs I had as a kid; well, they did go off by themselves.

    Why is it that we need to be trained and background-checked to own a gun but need nothing of the sort to keep a dog?

    I can see not needing to be particularly concerned about a Chihuahua; but the larger the dog the more concerned one has to be. The more concerned neighbors have to be about a dog in the neighborhood that isn’t always under the effective control of its master.

    We need to begin to be concerned about cars that drive themselves. Should manufacturers be the sole judge of whether their programmers and engineers know how to make cars that drive themselves?

    Maybe it’s so that we are all a little safer with dogs in the neighborhood. Maybe we will be a lot safer as more cars drive themselves. But how do we – as a society – make these decisions?

    Oh; I think I know. The elites of our society figure out what decisions they should make for all our safety. They decide whether they can control a population of dog-keepers. They decide whether driver-less cars are a net benefit to safety. They decide who really needs arms to make themselves safer.

    • This is the best, most intelligent argument presented on this site. May seem trite to some
      pseudo intellectuals, but totally common sense.

  7. Just dogs, human life trumps dogs every time. Idiots who keep and breed dangerous dogs are even more dangerous than the dogs. I’m pretty sick of dog owners think everyone should love dogs. I don’t love dogs, I would never hurt one intentionally but if one is bites me that changes the rules.

    • you hold humans that torture, rape and kill others over all the nicest sweetest creatures in the world. i know. that’s you and your beliefs.

      • @tsbhoa.p.jr You know nothing about me. And as far as a dogs go, I have see dogs that were cared for, loved, never abused or mistreated attack both people and other animals. If you have ever been bitten by a dog or attacked for no reason including children? I have… and I don’t give a shit how much you love your dog, if he bites me he’s gone, right in front of you.

        • I was attacked by a large German Shepherd when I was a child. It was larger than I was at the time, and lunged at my face. The emergency doctor told my mother I would have lost my eyeball if any of the dog’s teeth that tore at my face had been 1/2 inch closer from any direction. Nobody – including the dog’s owners, who were friends of our family – ever expected the dog to lunge at me, or anybody for that matter.

          You cannot know what goes on in an animal’s mind, and the larger it is, the more you must be aware that anything can happen. Sure, this doesn’t necessarily apply to all dogs – I’m sure some of you have great furry additions to your family, as do I. But it *does* happen.

          BTW, here in SoCal, when I tell people we should have open carry restored (and they give me the jaw-drop look of disbelief) I remind them that I’ve been chased by large dogs, coyotes, crazy druggies, etc. while jogging on mountain trails or even in the more remote streets of our community.

        • “and I don’t give a shit how much you love your dog, if he bites me he’s gone, right in front of you.”

          IF my dogs bites you, it’s because he perceived you as a threat to either himself or me, and IF I perceive you as a threat to either my dog or myself, I’ll drop you where you stand, without hesitation…

          Keep your distance, respect OUR space, and all will be well…get too close, and he’ll warn you, as he’s been trained to do…you see, I have a service dog, I have a 40% hearing loss, and don’t hear behind me, He sits against the back of my legs and lets me know when someone approaches, IF you get too close too fast, he’ll growl, to warn the person(s) approaching, and to let me know that someone is approaching…he’s doing his job…

          • @WI Patriot(?) Wow, you sound like someone just itching to pull the trigger on someone. I wouldn’t have even considered the dog owner a potential threat unless I heard or saw the owner do something very specfic to provoke the dog to attack me. But you are willing to kill another human based on your dog’s behavior? You need to get some help man, before you end up making the biggest mistake of your life.

        • milton bradley, missionary baptist, mowel bovement, everything i know about you stems from what you’ve told us here.
          i’ll take cute and fuzzy bunnies over human vermin. you do you.
          and just to be clear, if my dogs attack you unprovoked i expect you to defend yourself. but since you’re a mont blanc i suspect my tea cup poodle will chew your eyes out and skull f*ck you.
          you’ll enjoy that. as richard pryor said, “it felt like a wet q- tip.”

          • Now I can’t stop laughing….I am starting to think maybe the Democrats have a point, some of the nuts on this forum have no business ever being near a firearm or anything sharper than a crayon.

  8. Sucks when something become the “thing” of choice for shitty people. Sucks even more when that thing is a living creature. Sucks triple when that living creature is a dog.

    Why can’t the various forms of society’s trash adopt each other as status symbols and not these poor dogs?

  9. I have four dogs and all are Pit mix or are a pit. All females. They love everybody and don’t step foot off my yard. The APBT is not a killing machine the mainstream media likes to make them out to be. It’s EXACTLY the same thing as guns are in the media and we all know how that is. The main 100% problem is idiot owners. I have owned dogs 60+ years including Chows. 90+% of dogs owners are clueless idiots about dogs. The problem dogs are un-neutered young males. It’s extremely important to get males neutered and provide plenty of exercise and proper socialization. A walk around the block once a week is NOT exercise.
    Unfortunately the clueless idiots who own them are too effing stupid to learn about them. Lots and lots of exercise, spay and neutering and living with a loving family is all of it. If a person does that, they aren’t a problem. If you can’t do that for your dog, DON’T HAVE ONE and I don’t want to listen to a bunch of stupid sh– from clueless idiots who have never owned one.

    • “…don’t have one.”
      i was hoping for a dog, but a coupla brats popped out.
      still though, they’re kinda neat.

  10. Not defending these dogs.
    But! Dogs are like kids, just ’cause you love ’em doesn’t mean I do.
    I have had several dogs that could have “gone bad”, they can be trained.
    Seen several kids go bad, can’t train ’em, and it’s illegal to shoot ’em.

  11. This is why we carry guns; all the time. Pepper spray is a good idea too. You never know. One should be armed even if he’s “Just taking out the trash.”

  12. i’ve got dog battle sturries. the only times i was challenged seriously was when approached by pairs (even two wheaton terriers can be a handful). it’s important to get your back against something, being flanked is bad. do not run away. at least carry stabby things, blunt things will need big velocity to be effective against lunkheads like these.
    animal aggressive breeds become human aggressive individuals quickly with the wrong reinforcements. the pinminds that inbreed these pooches are far too nonchalant with the loaded weapons they’ve created.
    but specific breed hating is just whining. ain’t no bad puppies unless you can tell they’re ~off~. in that case wading pool, make some more.
    read about mallossers, genetics of which both dogs in this instance have some percentage.
    whatever the species the evil ones should be removed.

    • Yellow labs tend have owners who license them, take them to the vet, play with them and love them. If labs were featured in ghettotastic rap videos they’d be out there tearing the flesh off people too having been mill bred and abused for that ghettotastic lifestyle. Lucky for them their goofy faces do not lend well to that “hard” look so popular in the hood and trailer parks across the nation.

    • Ask and you shall receive!

      The lab is the most likely dog to bite in the UK
      https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/dog-breed-most-likely-to-attack-bite-you-revealed-a7166296.html

      Boy, three, left with horrific facial injuries as Labrador savages him while his mother strokes puppy
      https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2003849/Boy-3-left-horrific-facial-injuries-Labrador-savages-Poole-Harbour.html

      Family dog attacks child of South Carolina parents whose infant son was killed by another pooch last year
      http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/months-infant-mauling-dog-attack-mcgrew-home-article-1.1237732

      Girl Attacked by Family’s Labrador Retriever
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Gse2J5bqWw

      Really, any search will give you pages and pages of them.

      • Reminds me of how the hippopotamus is supposedly the tourist-killiest animal in Africa because people don’t take them seriously.

      • And yet a quick google search brings up hundreds of examples of maiming and deaths from pit bulls. You don’t honestly think labs or goldens are as dangerous as your average pit bull do you?
        Anyone that has lived in a big city in the United States knows to steer clear of loose Pit Bulls, Chows, and Rotties. It’s like street life 101. The dogs generally have bad owners for sure but there is a reason those owners choose certain dog types. They have builds meant for fighting and worse.

        • Joseph I was responding to the question of “where are all of the stories…” And I replied with those specific stories and how you can easily find them.
          The question of what breed is more dangerous is a stupid one. It is lazy and it is dangerous. Like the comment above that assumes the family Labrador is safe. It is not.
          As a breed, are Pitts potentially more dangerous than Labs? Sure. Does that matter to the child who gets mauled by a Lab? I doubt it.

      • Here’s another one:
        https://www.dogsbite.org/
        Pit bulls contribute to about 2/3rds of the fatal dog attacks in the US and they make up less than 10% of the dog population. Of course you can find stories about other breeds attacking people, but when it comes to dogs killing people, it’s not even close.
        In terms of what to do about it: ban the breeding and selling of them and let nature take its course with the ones in circulation.

        • And here is where I will disagree. I like dogs in general. And I am not for the banning of any dog type. It took literally hundreds if not thousands of generations of dogs to get to the average breed we see on the street. I just hate the fact that people use the dog for evil purposes. The problem is not with the dog but with the men who own them. Some people use guns for harm and that leads for calls to destroy the gun. Others call for the destruction of Pit Bulls and similar dogs and that leads to the destruction of the dog.
          If you are a Christian, you believe that we were given dominion over nature. That does not mean that we abuse it but that we have the intelligence, wisdom, and faculties that God gave us to have power over the world and its creatures. When we abuse that power generally things go south for mankind.
          That does not mean that dogs however are not bred for certain purposes. People who think a Pit-Bull, a Rottie, or a Dogo are the same thing as a lab are sorely mistaken. It’s myopic at best to think that the breeding of a Wolf into something different over hundreds or thousands of generations which would produce the desired trait is just dust under the rug. They are playing with fire. In the right context a Pit-Bull or a Rottie is a wonderful breed. When they are used by miscreants and brigands, (your average street thugs) that’s where the problem starts. Just look at the video.

        • JWTaylor fortunately they’re not basing their research solely on news articles. They also look at police reports, social media, court documents, etc. And then they compare their numbers to the CDC mortality database to make sure they’re in the ballpark, and they seem to be spot-on. They’re also very transparent about how they get their data:

          https://www.dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-fatality-citations-data-collection.php

          So yes, other kinds of dogs bite (not necessarily kill) people sometimes too. But pit bulls kill more than all the other dogs combined. And I don’t buy the “bad owner problem” argument one bit. I know too many people and family members who were attacked – or their dogs were attacked – by pit bulls owned by great people and loving dog owners. They’re just plain more prone to violence, and the statistics support that theory.

          Admittedly, I didn’t read the Wikipedia link you posted. Because it’s Wikipedia.

        • Micah, under the breed tracking section of the link you listed, they make it pretty clear that they get breed information from media reports primarily.

  14. I love when TTAG posts “dogs attack/kill/maim someone” and it’s always nurture vs nature. I’ll go with officer Hannibal. I hear of very few poodle maulings…I see quite a few gang types straining to control their lovable pitbulls😄

    • That’s cuz poodles are the LGBT members of the dog world, and just want to be friends with everyone in their Zumba classes.

  16. Dogs are bred for certain traits. People see physical and behavior traits and breed for those things. That is why the breed is the difference. The dog does what it’s bred to do. The responsibility is still on the owner in the long term , but it’s also the breed.

  17. Any dog that weighs enough can maul a human, its not the breed its the owners who teach their animals to be weapons. Saying pitts should be outlawed “because they’re dangerous” is the same ignorance as saying semi auto rifles should be banned “because they’re dangerous”….

  18. One thing is certain and that is the bigger and stronger the dog, the more likely a dog can attack. Bigger breeds need to be carefully raised by their masters to limit aggression no matter the breed.

  19. We have laws in many States and cities prohibiting the owning of dangerous animals like Lions and Tigers so tell me how pit bulls are any different. The facts are they are not and they kill people all the time. The States and cities that do ban them are correct in doing so. In my own neighborhood we had a shiftless dog owner let his dog run loose and it went clear across town and went up into the neighbors yard and bit off half the face of a 3 year old girl playing with her doll on her own porch. Not only should the dog have been shot by the police but the owner should have been shot by the police as well. The owner was not shot because he was white but would have probably been shot if he had been a minority.

    In the U.S. one cope recently calmed a white hysterical woman he stopped in a traffic stop. He told her to calm down because the Cops usually only shoot black people. This was his exact words. He then laughed about it and when it went viral he said “fuck the media” I was in the process of retiring anyway, but his statement was not meant as a joke but as the real truth and everyone sure as hell knew he was not joking about gunning down minorities. They are fair game in the U.S. of Hey and the Stats prove it.

    I remember one incident earlier this year that showed the cops using a minority for target practice. They had shot him and he was dying in a pool of blood, lots of blood, he tried to crawl forward and he had no gun in his hand but they then decided to use up the rest of their ammo and shoot him some more. It reminded me of something that would have happened in Nazi Germany only now its happening in the U.S.

    • When the boy was 16 years old, he watched “The Wizard of Oz” for the first time. The nightmares went on for months. To this day, he still thinks that movie was a documentary.

  20. Some of the problem with pitbulls is their owner’s doing but it’s also in their genes. I consider them to be a menace and wouldn’t think twice about blowing one away if it was acting like trouble was about to happen.

  21. Defensive gun use story??? should have been.
    Not sure about Philly laws,,, in Maryland pedestrians are open game to feral dogs.

  24. “IF my dogs bites you, it’s because he perceived you as a threat to either himself or me, and IF I perceive you as a threat to either my dog or myself, I’ll drop you where you stand, without hesitation…

    Keep your distance, respect OUR space, and all will be well…get too close, and he’ll warn you, as he’s been trained to do…you see, I have a service dog, I have a 40% hearing loss, and don’t hear behind me, He sits against the back of my legs and lets me know when someone approaches, IF you get too close too fast, he’ll growl, to warn the person(s) approaching, and to let me know that someone is approaching…he’s doing his job…”

    And you’ll go to jail.

    Please, everyone else, don’t subscribe to such terrible nonsense. Jail sucks.

    • @DFW , Sounds like @WI Patriot: has some serious issues with anger and self esteem, sounds like he should not have a gun, or a dog, or ever travel to Texas with either… Maybe someone will get him some help before he ends up on the wrong side of bars or barrels.

  25. I was an animal control officer for eight years. I had to shoot a catahoula leopard dog (a breed I did not know) that attacked me. I was called to the area because it was chasing people in the neighborhood. While talking with the owner, it returned home and attacked me. I back peddled away from the owner and drew my pistol. The dog went out into the street and ran about half a block away. I left the yard into the street and the dog re-focused on me, it came for round two. Being in an area full of houses I did not want to shoot it as it approached me out of fear of hitting a bystander. I knew (I don’t know why I knew this) it would break left or right and try to attack me from behind. I turned with it and shot it in a downward angle as it went around my left side. The shot was an inch or two left of the spine and and exited in the middle of the dogs belly. It was six to eight inches south of the heart. With a .45 hollow point there was not an immediate stop. The dog went under the trailer and hid. My supervisor arrived and negotiated dog being put out of misery and a $114 ticket. Dog expired shortly after that, about 20-25 minutes after the shooting.

    The shitty thing is, after people heard the shot and came out of their houses to see what was going on they got all pitch fork and torch on me because I shot the dog.

    • If you were animal control, why didn’t you have a snare pole…??? After all, you were out on a call, and this wasn’t a chance encounter…

      Once again, the use of deadly force was a first thought…

      • The dog was not there, had been gone for hours. How long have you been in animal control? Do you really think dog catchers carry a net on pole all day? You get attacked by a dog and see what you do. It is very primal experience.

        And no, deadly force was not my first thought. Getting out of the dog’s yard and away from the dog’s owner was the first and second thought.

        Would you have have wanted me to skip my third thought and allow the dog to take me down from behind?

      • Hey speedy, I’d love to see you grab a charging dog with a snare pole. You’re some sort of special aintcha.

      • Imagine having so few brain cells to rub together in your vacant head that you have a problem with violent dogs being put down.

        Sure there are times when it is unjustified, but I doubt you were there.

  26. Pit bulls kill the most people – by a huge margin – more than any other dog breed – accounting for about 66% of the deaths in the US despite accounting for less than 7% of the dog population.

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2018/09/13/americas-most-dangerous-dog-breeds-infographic/#5939543562f8

    https://www.dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-fatalities.php

    Rottweilers and GSDs are high on the list. Labs also will kill people. An aggressive dog is any aggressive dog, but anyone who doesn’t understand that pit bulls are categorically more deadly than all other dog breeds is just ignorant. Sure, there are dogs with stronger bites than pits, but they sure don’t manage to kill as many people as pits do. That’s one of many reasons I don’t sit on the edge of my seat for tactical advice from TTAG.

    I don’t believe in banning any particular breed (or gun), but anyone who loses control of their pit, and it looks like it’s going to bite me or my own, will likely be short a dog. My Weimaraner is more aggressive than my lab, and if either gets put down mid attack because I lost control of them, it’s my own fault. Be responsible with your dogs and your guns.

    I fully support more and better training for cops dealing with dogs, but it seems plenty of the commentors here could use more training in that subject as well. Your “harmless” pit might not look harmless to someone else. Even my lab isn’t completely harmless. They are animals, after all.

    • Pits are banned from all Fed Gov housing, most State housing, large Cities, and many hundreds of municipalities. I would be surprised if there were more than a few million in the US.
      They account for over 70% of fatalities from dog attack while only being less than 5% of all US dogs… yet as much as posters here and else where try to cover for them, up to 1 million pits are euthanized per year. At least some of their owners wake up to how deadly they are FFS!
      A study by the organization Animal People reports a 93% euthanasia rate for pit bulls and only one in 600 pits finding a forever home.
      https://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2018/09/04/woman-mauled-to-death-by-rescue-pit-bull/
      You too could be so lucky…

  27. If aggression can be bred out of an animal species in a few generations, it stands to reason one could breed back in aggression. See this Russian scientist’s long running experiment on domesticating foxes. http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/d-brief/2016/09/14/russian-experiment-breeds-domesticated-foxes/
    It did not take him long to breed affectionate and docile foxes. I bet anyone could reverse the process just a quickly by selecting for aggression.

    We probably have a situation that there are lines within the pit bull sub-species, and other dog breeds, that are more inherently aggressive than others. Terrible owners are that abuse dogs are blurring the lines even more.

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