This is such a bizarre story.
More than 100,000 people have signed an online petition to spare the lives of two dogs after a biting incident that left a 4-year-old boy with an amputated arm.
Authorities said the child was in the yard of a home in Layton, Utah, on Sunday when he reached through a vinyl fence and into a neighbor’s yard where the two dogs were.
Layton Fire Battalion Chief Jason Cook told NBC News that the child had a sock on his arm and that one of the dogs bit him so severely it cut off a part of his arm.. . .
Following the incident, a woman who says she is a friend of the dogs’ owner created a petition on Care2 asking for the dogs to be saved.
“This situation is unfortunate on both sides,” the petition reads. “There are fears that Bear might be put down and he doesn’t deserve to be put down for this freak accident.”
First, the family disputes the notion that the 4-year old boy had a sock on his arm, and insists that the dog dug under a fence separating the yards in order to attack the boy. According to a follow-up story,
The husky injured the boy near 1100 North and 3600 West in Layton on March 3. The child’s hand was not recovered and was believed to have been ingested by the dog.
It was originally reported that the boy may have been playing with the dog by sticking his hand under the fence where the dog was corralled. But the boy’s mother, Hope Brown, later posted on social media that it was the dog who “went under our fence and bit Austin’s hand and then attempted to pull him back under the fence.
“Our baby lost his arm from the elbow down because it was ingested by the dog. He has multiple other bites as well as severe bruising on his face and jaw, and a black eye.”
. . .
“It was an unprovoked attack. His daddy had eyes on him the entire time and the moment Austin was pulled, John was right there. He ran right over. Austin never lost consciousness during the attack,” she wrote. “When we asked Austin what happened that first few seconds he said, ‘I saw a puppy nose! I touched the puppy nose and it bit my fingers and pulled me.’
“It only took a second for one of those dogs to dig under the fence just enough to get his snout and part of his head under.”
Second, the petition amazingly reached 180,000 people. Who knew there were that many people who have no problem with dangerous animals being allowed in communities with children.
The owners of the dogs were forced to surrender them to animal control authorities, but the animals are not being euthanized which is simply bizarre.