That this is awful for the poor dog...

[Softlysoftly]

....link but I don't feel 1 ounce of sympathy for the feckless owner?

[NOTE FROM MNHQ: we've been asked to warn people that the photo in the linked article may be upsetting for some.]

"So all his witnesses are lying?"

No, just that I have eyes and can see a photo

But he didn't attack a human, he attacked an aggressive dog that had initiated the attack on his animal.
I am constantly being told here that a dog that is aggressive towards other dogs is usually not a threat to humans.
Do you think that a man who was prepared to slaughter an animal poses a similar threat to people? Perhaps if he was attacked by another person and in fear for his life, but that goes for most people I'd have thought.

I still agree with the OP, it is a terrible thing to have happened to any animal. Terrible and completely unnecessary, if the owner had better control over her animal, this incident would never have occurred.
But how many others are grateful that the dog is now no longer a threat to the animals and children in the area it once roamed?

Humans are capable of more complex thought than dogs are. The dog acted solely upon instinct, the man acted out of thought. Instinct would have been to grab the first thing at hand, a chain of complex thoughts and decisions would lead to to selecting several knives, of different sizes, a normal person would have the ability to understand that by choosing such weapons they are likely to end the life of another animal. Dogs do not have that same thought process.

My knives are in a knife block, one grab would yield a fistful without any selection., and if I was doing that I'd also be trying to kill the dog.
As for the idea of stabbing it once, waiting to see if it was still a threat and then deciding whether to stab it again or believe that it was incapacitated?
I doubt I'd be thinking that clearly.

"I am constantly being told here that a dog that is aggressive towards other dogs is usually not a threat to humans.
Do you think that a man who was prepared to slaughter an animal poses a similar threat to people? "

Not necessarily, but I do think he got carried away and just didnt know when to stop. His nasty bastard temper might mean he could get carried away if he got into fisticuffs with a person. I dont believe that is such a stretch of the imagination tbh.

But why continue stabbing it after it has been incapacitated and is in dying in it's owners arms? If not for some kind of sick enjoyment?

As I said had he stabbed the dog until it stopped the attack, then I might feel differently, but he carried on his attack for longer than was necessary to protect his own dog.

He could have stabbed this dog until backed off and then left it to die as peacefully as possible, under the circumstances, in his owners arms. Instead he carried on stabbing the dog while the owner was holding on to it.

Those are not the actions of a person who wanted only to save his dog. He wanted to kill this dog, regardless of whether his own dog got away or not.

But Woffling surely you'd stop once you could see a person was shielding the dog, and the dog was no longer a threat? Surely anyone (without serious anger issues or a major dog hater) would stop if all the effect they wanted was to stop the dog from attacking your own?

Id stop and just be thankful the dog had ceased the attack just to be able to rush to my dog to check it was ok, I certainly wouldnt leave her there with her terrible (if we are to believe the article) close to death injuries while I carried on stabbing the other dog while it lay dying.

I'm certain that he wanted to kill the dog.
I think a lot of other people in the neighbourhood are grateful that he did.
Let's wait and see what the official response is, and if he goes to trial.

Whether the community was grateful or not is irrelevant, if the dog was as dangerous as it is believed to have been, they should have reported it to the Police.

The police seized a toothless, elderly dog, with joint problems under the DDA not long ago, I highly doubt they would ignore several reports of a Bulldog running out of control and being used to threaten young adults.

You cannot take the law into your own hands. Maybe this dog did need to be pts, in which case it should have been done humanely in a vets office, not in a sustained and brutal attack which would have been horrifically painful and terrifying for the dog.

In broad daylight too, where any number of children could have been looking on.

Yes, something needed to be done about this dog and it's owner. Yes, the owner was irresponsible. None of that excuses this kind of attack.

The point is, you can't just go round killing dogs because you feel like it. It doesn't matter how feckless the owner was, it doesn't matter how dangerous the dog is, if it's dangerous it should be reported through official channels.

Stabbing a dog to protect yourself, another person or animal=acceptable. Stabbing a dog to death because you feel like it/lost your temper/knew it had been a nuisance on previous occasion but didn't need to do so to protect anyone or anything because the attack has ended = not acceptable.

We don't know how many, if any, reports were made about the dog. I certainly lived for years in an area with free-range large dogs behaving aggressively, and nothing was done because the police were too busy with the dealers, the muggers, the assaults by human on human and the domestics.
The dog would have had to seriously attack or kill a human before anything was done.

I have an American Bulldog (crossed with a Shar Pei) and I do have to agree with comments upthread. Once she has a grip of something (like a pull rope) there is no chance of you getting it off her. She will drop it in your hand or lap, but when playing tug of war she could easily pull your shoulder out of your socket. She has incredible strength, and is massive. Thankfully, she is great with children and other dogs, but there is absolutely NO WAY I would ever trust her alone with young children or other dogs. And she is ALWAYS on her lead when out because if she did end up turning, she could cause massive damage. It was extremely stupid and idiotic of that dogs owner to let him wander around the estate knowing what the dog had previously done. Poor dog, she let him down big time

After looking at those pictures, I looked at my huge softy lay snuggled next to me and it just really turned my stomach. I couldn't even begin to imagine the same happening to her

I agree, in an ideal world you would report an act of aggression by a dog that hadn't ended in serious mutilation or death, and it would be dealt with and the dog owner and dog would never be repeat offenders. But that's not what happens IRL.
If it did, the conflict between dog lovers and those who don't wouldn't be as heated.

I just retread the article and nowhere does it say he continued the attack after it had let go of his dog

His account was that he kicked and punched but it wouldnt budge, he says the owner just stroked the dog while he was trying to get it to stop. That doesn't say he attacked after the dog let go? It clearly says he was tryi g to save his dog.

Her account was that they were huddled together away from the knives but I'm not sure I'd believe someone who lets an out of control dog run free and sets it on people. Her cut could have come just as easily by being caught in the middle while the dogs still fought and he stabbed.

Wiggling, regardless of whether police or dog wardens act effectively, people don't have the right to take the law in their own hands.

Softly, but you'd instead believe someone who lost it and stabbed a dog 23 times?

The articles are clearly biased towards this man. They like a good 'dog attack' story. I can't imagine them using the words 'small terrier' to describe a staffy who had attacked another dog or a child.

I agree, but he would claim defence of his dog, unpremeditated protection.
Which isn't against he law. Poisoning the dog would be.

I think it's a difficult case, certainly the dog was out of control and a
Threat to his own dog, but stabbing it that many times? I can understand once, or maybe twice, which would be enough to deter even a quite determined attack, But 23 times? Sounds unhinged to me. Also, he went and got the knives, came back 5 minutes later and the dog was still attacking his? I doubt it, the other dog would likely have been dead by that time, American bulldogs are huge, powerful animals and have jaws of steel. Tell me now, if your dog was being attacked, would you have walked off to get a knife or would you have got the attacking dog off with any means that came to hand?

If there was any suggestion he had continued stabbing the dog beyond the point where his own dog was no longer at risk, I'm absolutely sure he would have been charged. The fact that he wasn't charged speaks volumes. The man did what he could to save his dog's life. If he had expert knowledge, or a handy hosepipe, he might have found a less awful way. But he didn't.

If there had been a chance to represent this elderly staffie as aggressive and provocative I'm sure the press would have seized that chance, so the fact that they didn't again suggests that the facts were as the staffie's owner stated them.

He hasn't been charged yet. All three different articles claim he still could be charged with criminal damage.

This is terrible, the poor dog; his owner let him down big time. If she'd bothered to treat him properly - train him, keep him in, muzzle him when out - this would never have happened. She is a fool and shouldn't be allowed to own another dog.

To all those people who are dubious about the complaints made to the police: I can very easily believe they turned a blind to his other attacks. A family a couple of doors away from me have three very large dogs (Anatolian shepherd, Neapolitan mastiff x lab and something they call a Japanese mastiff), the latter has made numerous attacks on other dogs, and one on a woman when it couldn't get to her dog. All these attacks have been reported to the police, we (the neighbours) have also reported them, for letting their 12 year old walk this dog. Nothing has been done about it.

Also, with such powerful dogs it really isn't that easy to stop them once they start to attack. They aren't like other large breeds. On one occasion this dog attacked a collie outside my house, my DH, my BIL (both big powerful men) and the owner of the collie couldn't stop it. At one point, my BIL kicked it hard in the testicles - it turned, snarled at him then continued to savage the other dog. Finally, a van full of builders pulled up and one jumped out with a rope, and very nearly throttled the dog before it let go. Meanwhile, the owner was doing nothing more than telling it to be a good boy and behave itself.

I love dogs. But if that thing got hold of mine, I'm afraid I would do whatever it took to save him.

WofflingOn

I agree about muzzling all dogs in public but how would one muzzle a pekinese, please?

RuleBritannia - with deep joy?