Witch hunt for old woman

It should at least be reported it to both police and dog warden before allowing the local mob to harass the person. People increasingly taking the law into their own hands doesn't bode well for any of us.

She may have already done this- you dont know she hasn't.

I am a dog owner and my dog has never attacked another dog but if he did I would be horrified and would have given my details.
But I also think witch hunts on Facebook are horrible, it's happened around parking wars in our village.
I think the elderly lady should do the right thing and offer to at least go halves on vet bills but abusive messages can and should be reported to the police

It should at least be reported it to both police and dog warden before allowing the local mob to harass the person. People increasingly taking the law into their own hands doesn't bode well for any of us.

it was irresponsible for the victim to do this rather than reporting it

To whom though? the police wont even come out if you've been burgled- they took two days to come and speak with my nan and told her they couldn't do anything. I've also reported some quite serious things (far more serious than this) and they've done nothing. They arent going to do jack shit about this. We dont even have a dog warden where I live.

Maybe she has reported it and was told nothing they can do so she's resorted to FB

I don’t think it’s healthy for a society if some adults are given a free pass and expect actions are lowered for some groups.

Yes, accidents happen but she should have given her details to the injured dog owner. What if the injuries were severe and the dog had to be PTS because the owner couldn’t cover vet bills?

FB is a convenient way of finding out about what’s gone on in the area. There would be no need for this hd the woman behaved responsibly, elderly or not. Although obviously there’s a difference between asking for info and a pile-on, the latter wouldn’t be acceptable imho.

She should pay for their vet bills. I suspect she ran at the time because she was being shouted at (also understandable in the circumstances but not helpful). Now the situation has escalated and she might feel she has a right not to pay if she can't leave her house and feels threatened. Once these things turn to FB we can all see what happens and it was irresponsible for the victim to do this rather than reporting it. If something happens to the older lady as a result no one will win.

It's not a witch hunt. It's an attempt to hold the responsible party responsible.

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It may have been intended as such but once it's been shared and Dave who lives 150 miles away and knows neither party chips in to pile on with nasty aggressive comments it becomes a witch hunt.

Again - it's wrong if this happened that the owner isn't doing the right thing. But this behaviour from complete strangers won't compel her to do it.

I dont believe she's "scared", I believe she doesnt want to pay and thats why she ran off.

Tough shit. Your dog attacks another, you should pay for it. If it had happened to her dog, you can bet she'd be the angry one in this scenario and wouldnt be "scared" then to chase the money.

Age is irrelevant. She behaved badly.
If it was a male teen that acted in this way he would be hung, drawn and quartered. And statistically she is far more likely to be able to afford any vet bills.

£80 vet bill? When was this? 1978?

Has to be a typo surely?!

There are two elderly people here who cause absolute havoc and ruin peoples' lives (not connected to each other). I'm so sick of their age being used as a defence. They're always scared and frail when confronted, never when they're abusing others.

(Although social media witch-hunts do need to be careful and can go too far.)

The owner of the attacking dog should pay the vet bill. I was left with an £80 vet bill after an off led dog attacked mine. No one offered to pay even after I sent a text with a photo of the hole after the vet had shaved and cleaned it.

no one should be conducting a "witch hunt" though.

Her dog was unrestrained and it attacked another dog. She refused to give contact details. She is at fault and should pay.

It's not a witch hunt. It's an attempt to hold the responsible party responsible.

Id find it uncomfortable, but wouldn't get involved

Where would you stand on this?

I would say that meaningless, subjective descriptors like ‘elderly’ should be avoided at all costs. Given the MN interpretation of the word, could be any age 50+.

Someone needs to respond to her relatives post that she needs to pay the vet bills and in future keep the dog on a lead or muzzled .

Following an old woman home isn't ok. However the woman's actions weren't ok either. This is what happens when irresponsible dog owners don't bother to put their animals on leads.

I suspect she's learnt her lesson, she should offer to pay for her mistake and then people should stop with the Facebook nonsense. It's so easy for every man and his dog (sorry) to get involved in incident that has nothing to do with them.

If it was possible the attacking dog should have been caught and taken away. I suspect little old lady would suddenly have an awful lot to say. Sort of thing my late DF would have done.

And if the individual in question was a young man I would think the same regards trial by Facebook

Agree with this also.

My comments regarding the SM pile on still stands as this came before.

Yeah it's very possible that the owner was getting in there first.

I don't know either of these people. I know one person ran off and one person got shouty. Neither are ideal, the scale of each determines the level of wrong doing

Maybe she had, or will. But multiple people in her community posting viciously about her will be incredibly upsetting. I've seen it happen on my local Facebook pages, and people are absolutely feral, despite not having been there and not knowing any of the truth of the incidents involved.

That's why, if I was ever on the position of needing to find out similar information, I'd switch commenting off and ask for identification via PM

Well, I'm not sure what to vote for in the poll, but I absolutely loathe and despise the disgusting lowlife behaviour of shaming people on facebook, and the kangaroo court that sets up their 'trial by social media.'

But this woman having a dog off the lead is also disgusting, and she needs to take responsibility for what her dog has done. The woman whose dog was attacked needs to report it to the police - maybe not 999 but 1O1 is it?

Good luck with her getting anywhere though. A similar thing happened to my friend about 6 years ago. She was walking her dog (spaniel, with long floppy ears;) and a dog off its lead attacked her dog and ripped two thirds of his ear off.

Cost her 2 grand in vet bills. She couldn't actually prove anything though. There was no CCTV or anything - and she ended up having to foot the full bill. She also had nearly a couple of thousand pounds worth of court costs, because she tried to press charges against the owner, and ended up losing, because she couldn't prove anything.

This is a really tricky one... I don't think the woman whose dog was hurt can do much about it unless she has proper proof of what the other dog has done. (Or the older woman admits it happened. I'm not sure if the relative posting, asking people to leave her alone contained any information that admitted the older woman's dog was at fault.)

But yeah tl;dr, the 'older woman' was in the wrong for sure, but the facebook shaming is scumbag behaviour.