YOU’RE Feeling Attacked Right Now?!

CONTENT WARNING: Dog Attack

I worked in veterinary medicine for more than thirty-six years, and we always dealt with some real doozies!

We had a lady come in with a Chow Chow for regular vaccines. After she signed in, she sat on the bench waiting to be seen. One of my techs walked over to her with a clipboard and pen in her hands to get some information. While she stood there speaking with the woman, her dog came over — he had been straining at the leash trying to get out the door — and with no warning, not even a growl, he grabbed hold of [Tech]’s hand with his teeth and began to try and rip her arm off! He shook his head, bit harder, and dragged her to the floor!

Instead of trying to get the dog off of [Tech], the woman began screaming at us for abusing her dog as we tried to break the dog free of [Tech]’s hand. Three of us were bitten trying to get her loose!!

Instead of an apology for owning an aggressive dog and not restraining it when she came in, the woman screamed at us:

Woman: “You people had no right to attack my dog like that and it’s your own fault for walking up to my dog!”

My tech ended up with four broken bones in her hand and a massive infection that put her in the hospital for four days, and in the end, the woman actually had the nerve to file a lawsuit claiming animal abuse against our hospital. She wanted more than $25,000 in emotional distress!

We shut the hospital down on the day of the trial — there was NO WAY we were going to settle — and every staff member who had been involved was there to testify.

In the end, the woman was forced to pay all court costs and lawyer fees, the cost of the medical treatment for every person who was injured, and the cost of shutting down the hospital to come to court, and she was given a fine by Animal Control for having an aggressive dog. She was also told that should the dog ever bite someone again, not only would the dog be put down, but she could be arrested and jailed for having a known aggressive animal in her home and not properly containing it.