Chained and dangerous, Vancouver Courier, February 29/04

By David Carrigg-staff writer

The mastiff stands at least six feet tall on its hind legs, its large paws pushing heavily against a ramshackle side gate at 3494 Knight St.

The dog barks constantly, stopping only to shake its head from side to side every few seconds, likely due to pain from barking so hard with an ear infection.

On a small back deck a few metres away, another mastiff with small lumps under its fur looks intently at its mate, a half-chewed red water bucket tipped over beside it.

A Beware of Dog sign in English and Chinese is affixed to the home's side gate.

The two mastiffs seem secure in the front half of the home's yard, divided by a shed, a broken-down van and a wire fence. But in the back yard, a Rottweiler is visible, sitting next to a wooden dog house, surrounded by large holes dug in the dirt.

The Rottweiler could never jump the nine-foot-high fence. But at the base of the side fence, about 15 feet back from the lane, is troubling evidence of another escape route: a hole about a foot wide and four inches deep, not yet deep enough for a large dog to get out, but getting there.

Standing halfway between the home and Tyee Elementary School, a block away, is Judy Stone.

Stone is the firebrand leader of Animal Advocates, a group that has convinced 11 Lower Mainland municipalities to adopt a "humane treatment of dogs" bylaw banning aggressive yard dogs, but has so far failed to persuade the City of Vancouver to do the same.

Stone, shivering in the cold and wearing gumboots, has made sure she can't be seen by the homeowners, who have spotted her before videotaping the dogs' living conditions.

"We've known about this house for four years and there's been a stream of dogs that appear there, then disappear, and then another dog will turn up," says Stone, who claims her organization receives dozens of e-mails and phone calls each year from people who live near yard dogs they believe are dangerous or neglected.

This spring, as the pound presents its five-year strategic plan to council, Stone hopes her group will have another chance to convince the city to introduce a bylaw preventing people from keeping potentially deadly dogs in city yards.

The group's primary motive, she says, is to improve conditions for dogs living in misery, but it's also concerned about the risk large-breed yard dogs pose to public safety. "This is an accident waiting to happen. A child will be murdered on their way to school. I keep telling people at the city, again and again, but no-one will listen. We thought someone would listen after what happened to [mauling victim] Shenica White."

In B.C., animal welfare issues are handled through the B.C. SPCA, charged with administering the provincial Cruelty to Animals Act.

However, if a dog owner can show the animal has food and water and some sort of shelter, there's little the B.C. SPCA can do.

With that in mind, Animal Advocates began approaching Lower Mainland municipalities in the mid 1990s, asking for bylaws that would enable city staff to seize dogs left alone, often chained, in yards for long periods of time.

Stone said the dogs are typically there to provide security for the homeowner, but the dogs' behaviour deteriorates the longer they're left alone. Dogs are social animals and some animal behaviour experts claim isolating them is cruel and leads to anti-social and potentially dangerous behaviour.

Animal Advocates' campaign was successful in many Lower Mainland municipalities, including Surrey, where the humane treatment of dogs bylaw was bolstered by a dangerous dog bylaw. Under the latter, a dog owner whose dog escapes and bites someone can be fined up to $10,000 or get six months in jail.

In July 2001, Animal Advocates made a pitch to the then-NPA Vancouver city council asking it to consider adopting a similar bylaw. The group presented dozens of photos and stories of chained dogs in Vancouver, backed by research showing yard dogs suffer mentally and physically as a result of lack of socialization and can become deadly if they escape their yards.

One photo shows a deranged looking white pit bull cross jumping against a nine-foot wooden fence, with its front feet over the edge. Another shows a Rottweiler tied on a three-foot chain to its pen.

The report included comments from Dr. Stanley Coren, a UBC animal psychology expert, who said the general consensus is that chaining a dog for long periods of time makes it aggressive. "There are even tracts which were found in the ruins of Pompeii suggesting that the way to make your guard dog vicious is to tether him to a short chain. If you believe anecdotal evidence (this from my own eleven years of teaching dog obedience classes), dogs which have been tied out are either vicious, fearful and hand-shy or both."

Staff's verdict, in the end, however, was that the Vancouver Charter doesn't contain any provisions allowing the city to adopt animal welfare bylaws, which Stone calls "pure hogwash," saying the city likely just didn't want to pay more Animal Control Officers for enforcement.

She argues the city could include a bylaw mandating humane treatment under its animal control bylaws, which are permitted under the charter. "The city has dozens of animal control bylaws and this would be just be one more."

Existing bylaws enable the city to seize dogs found wandering, while a vicious dog bylaw dictates any dog considered dangerous must be kept in a childproof pen and muzzled and leashed when taken outside.

Despite the fact that any pit bull or pit bull cross is automatically considered vicious by the city, only 12 dogs are actually on the dangerous list.

Bob Cristofoli, the city pound's supervisor of field operations, said that number includes dogs of other breeds that have been reported as vicious by neighbours, adding he doesn't know why the list contains so few pit bulls.

If a dog considered vicious is found at large, owners must pay higher fines and the pound may consider euthanizing the dog.

Last year, the city pound investigated 109 dog bite complaints, but just three of those dogs were put down.

Stone said the B.C. SPCA promised the city it would conduct an education campaign to convince dog owners not to buy large-breed dogs for protection and not to leave dogs unattended for long periods, but that never happened.

"In the two and a half years since the city and the SPCA agreed that the SPCA would educate on this issue, not one scrap of education has been done that I can find, not one brochure in the Vancouver SPCA, not even in English."

Craig Daniell, chief executive of the B.C. SPCA, said the society provides information to the owners of dogs it has investigated, and is also considering producing educational brochures in different languages. Information given to owners explains that it's not healthy for dogs to be tethered or left alone for long periods of time, and that dogs need at least two 30-minute exercise sessions a day, while aggressive dogs should be trained.

Lorie Chortyk, the B.C. SPCA's community relations manager, said the society has received four complaints about the dogs kept at 3494 Knight St. But despite the male dog's obvious aggression, the society has been unable to seize the animals because their basic care needs are being met.

To Ha Ly, who owns the Knight Street home and the dogs, insists the dogs are not a danger, arguing that the B.C. SPCA is harassing him for no good reason. "People are always complaining about my dogs because they bark as they walk past. They aren't guard dogs, they are pets. They don't hurt my children," said Ly, who believes the animals would not be able to escape the yard.

Ly said the Rottweiler the Courier observed in the back yard has since been given to a friend, adding he doesn't keep his two mastiffs in the back section of the yard, where the hole was dug under the fence.

Ly was willing to take the male mastiff, Simbia, out of the yard for a photo. However, he warned that anyone coming within about six feet of him and the dog would likely be attacked. Ly struggled to keep hold of the dog when the reporter got too close.

"Simbia doesn't like adults but he loves kids," said Ly, explaining why the dog was struggling to run toward nearby Tyee Elementary School.

Despite Ty's claims, his property and dogs are still being investigated by the B.C. SPCA.

Given Animal Advocates' warnings about the danger posed by unsocialized large-breed dogs at large, a trip to the city's pound, at 1280 Raymur Ave. opposite the southwest corner of Strathcona Park, is troubling.

On a January morning, the dogs available for adoption included Rottweilers, Rottweiler crosses, a German Shepherd and three American Bulldogs.

Manager Nancy Clay said the pound has a strict policy of not allowing dogs to be adopted out to families or individuals who want guard dogs. Most of the dogs in her shelter have either been found wandering the street or were handed over by police who found them guarding marijuana grow-ops.

Clay admits the city's bylaw has no provisions that would allow an animal control officer to seize a potentially dangerous dog tethered in its yard, or one that's at risk of escaping.

"We have no welfare or animal cruelty bylaws. That's the responsibility of the B.C. SPCA. They are supposed to look after welfare," she said. "That's an issue we feel we need to deal with, but up to this point we haven't had the bylaw or the resources to do enforcement in that area."

That lack of enforcement may have played a role in the vicious mauling of 15-year-old Shenica White just over a year ago.

At about 1 a.m. on Dec. 22, 2002, White was walking with a friend on the 400-block of East 28th Avenue. Some hours earlier, two dogs, both Rottweiler-crosses, had escaped from their yard at 537 East 19th Avenue and were at large.

A statement of claim filed last September by a lawyer for White, who is suing the dogs' owners, says the two dogs attacked White, repeatedly biting her arms, head and face, resulting in massive blood loss, severe lacerations to her face and upper left arm and nerve damage to her face. The attack only stopped when enough neighbours came out to forcibly remove the dog from the girl, who had been dragged several metres down the road.

The dogs were seized by police, handed to the city pound and destroyed-although only after the pound had received permission from owner Calvin Chow.

Media accounts after the incident indicated the dogs were known by their neighbours to be aggressive, often terrorizing people who walked past the home, owned by Chow's parents.

Dale Pope, the lawyer representing White in her civil action against Diane, Jackie and Calvin Chow, said no damage amount has been set because White is still undergoing treatment for her injuries. Besides permanent facial disfigurement, White suffered trauma and depression as a result of the attack, according to the statement of claim.

Pope maintains the dogs' owner and caretakers owed a duty of care to the general public to ensure the dogs wouldn't hurt others.

Diane and Jackie Chow, in response, have said the dogs were properly trained, supervised, cared for and had never before caused harm to others or exhibited aggressive behaviour. They also claim that if White suffered any injury, it was caused by her own negligence, "the particulars of which will be provided as they become known to counsel."

The incident left many Vancouverites edgy about vicious-looking yard dogs. On Jan. 21, a Vancouver Police Department officer entered a yard at 7841 Windsor St. in the dark and was walking around the side of the house when he encountered a dog running up to him and barking madly. Unaware that the dog was chained along the side of the house, he shot the animal, to the consternation of the family.

Stone, however, said that anyone who chains up a dog outside for long periods runs the risk that the dog will become "desocialized" and dangerous.

"I'll concede the dog might have stopped someone walking along the side of the house, but is it really fair to use a dog as a cheap alarm system? What I've heard is they are looking for a replacement dog, and that's disgraceful."

Stone is confident council will pressure staff to reexamine the Vancouver Charter and approve a humane treatment of dog bylaw, saying the COPE council elected a little over a year ago "seems to be humanitarian."

"They've been so busy they haven't had the time to look at our proposal. I think it will be a different story when we make another presentation in the spring."

Jeri Lyn Ratzlaff, another Animal Advocates member, argues the city needs to adopt some sort of bylaw, or risk being sued if another child is viciously attacked or killed. "Regardless of whether or not the public understands that it's inhumane animal care that causes a dog to become vicious, it should be blatantly clear by now to the public that a dangerous dog, chained or running loose, is a very serious public safety issue," Ratzlaff said.

"A person, most likely a child, will die from being savagely attacked by a dangerous dog that the City of Vancouver knew about. And if it's before something gets done, the city could be in a lot of trouble."

Side Bar:

Never run from aggressive dogs

The Canadian Safety Council estimates 460,000 people are bitten by dogs in Canada each year, about half of them children. Here are a few tips to avoid being attacked by an aggressive dog.

* Stand still and avoid eye contact. If the dog comes closer, turn to the side and start to slowly walk away. Don't raise your arms or run, or it will instinctively chase you.

* Call out a command to the dog, like sit, stay or stop. If the dog is small and rushes at you, a firm kick in its ribcage will usually scare the animal off.

* If the dog is larger, try and get something between you and the animal, such as a jacket, umbrella or backpack. Use one arm to protect your throat and with the other, be prepared to punch the dog in the nose, poke its eyes or try and kick at the animal.

* If you go down, roll up into a ball and cover your neck and face.

* Parents are also advised to tell children never to approach a dog they don't know and never to roughhouse with a dog, especially playing tug-of-war games.