Everyone knows one of those dog owners who purchase teeny-tiny shoes for their dogs’ delicate feet, carry their dogs around in designer papooses, and otherwise treat their puppies like they’re four-year-old beauty queens and they—the owners—are shitshow stage moms in the grand tradition of Lynne Spears. But there’s a shitshow of another breed out there: dog owners who will beat a person up for possibly touching their dog, as one woman allegedly had the misfortune of finding out last Tuesday, when officers were dispatched to Belmont Avenue on Capitol Hill in response to an altercation between dog walkers.
The alleged freak out took place at 1:30 p.m., according to the police report, which states that a professional dog walker and her daughter (presumably a child) were serenely walking a client’s dog down the street when “her client’s dog was approached by an off-leash, black-colored Boxer canine that evidently belonged to the unknown suspect.”
The woman reacted as she says any professional would: She attempted to shoo the unwelcome dog away by “squatting down to the dog’s level and moving the hand in a horizontal motion toward the dog’s neck,” according to the report. So, basically, almost hitting the dog without actually hitting it. In fact, the report states that “she insists she did not touch the Boxer while making the hand motion.”
Unfortunately for the woman, the Boxer’s owner wasn’t familiar with her professional technique. The report states that he yelled, “Don’t hit my dog!”
And when she tried to explain her professionalism, etc., he “reportedly responded by swinging at her head with a cupped device that is intended to lengthen the throwing distance of tennis balls, commonly used by dog owners playing ‘fetch’ with canines.”
The report explains that his first alleged swing must’ve missed, because he “reportedly followed up by swinging a second time, this time striking [the woman] on the right side of her forehead, resulting in a visible bump.”
The victim’s daughter was “visibly upset” by the attack, the woman called 911, and the man “continued walking southeast on Belmont Avenue” with his tennis ball thrower/alleged assault weapon in hand.
The suspect is still at large, ostensibly taking his leashless Boxer to a mani-pedi followed by a sunglasses-fitting. (Confidential to said suspect: You live in a city, dude. Leash your dog.)
dogs are disgusting creatures and only belong in rural areas, please keep them the fuck away from me here in the city
well, that dipshit will undoubtedly return to the dog park on Pine just before you cross the freeway. The victim should case it out and call the cops the second he sets foot there.
Can you make that last sentence bigger? Like a LOT bigger? I still don’t fucking understand how people think it’s okay to walk around one of the most densely populated areas on the whole west fucking coast with their dog offleash.
My old dog, on leash, will attempt to bite your offleash dog that wanders up to us and there isn’t much I can do to get your dog to back off. I can pull my old dog in close and try to control her, but your offleash dog is free to get all up in our grills. Not cool.
Ooh, ranty.
how about just letting dogs meet? when an offleash dog comes up to my dog, i drop her leash & let them sniff each other. then, when they are done, my dog walks away from the other dog, over to me & i pick up the leash again & we continue on our walk. i’ve done this approximately 1000 times wo/ incident.
When I moved to Capitol Hill last year, I hadn’t expected the dog people. Guess it takes all kinds.
I actually like dogs. Really. It’s dog owners I could live without.
@4 My dog is just simply not good with other dogs on or off leash. If both dogs are on leash there is no issue, just some barking and complete control over the situation on my part.
@7
not saying at all that you should do this or that or the other thing, but my dog is very aggressive w/ other dogs when she is on leash. after some study, i discovered that the aggression was actually caused by being on the leash. when dogs are restrained, it encourages them to be aggressive. taking away the restraint often takes away the aggression as well. now, when other dogs come up to my dog, i drop the leash & the worst thing that has ever happened is a ‘woof’ while walking away from the dog & back to me.
a recent trip to honduras made me realize just how much americans fuck up their dogs w/ the way that we treat them in this country. dogs are naturally social creatures & we put them on leashes & behind fences & never let the interact freely w/ other dogs (or often other people). this is completely unnatural & totally fucks up the dog (how do people raised in cages & in chains do when interacting w/ other people). in honduras, every dog roamed free & not a single dog had a problem interacting w/ any other dogs or any people.
now, i know that we in america are never gonna let our dogs run free, but the point that i think dog owners can take home & use sometimes is that the american answer of what to do w/ your dog in this or that situation is heavily overindexed to being 100% against the nature of a dog. so, look for counterintuitive solutions to your dog problems, because as a rule in this country when it comes to dogs, we do it wrong.
@6: WORD.
People who don’t leash their dogs are morons. As a “professional dogwalker”, if there is such a thing, I encounter off leash dogs almost daily. DumDum Owner always shouts “it’s okay…he’s friendly!” Well guess what DumDum…not all dogs are and there is a good chance I am walking a leash-reactive dog.
With having a dog, comes the responsiblity of keeping it safe. Allowing it to run around off leash is, frankly, putting it’s life in danger: it could get hit by a car, attacked by an on-leash dog…or worse. When that happens the only one to blame is DumDum:
What a nasty animal. I hope he gets run over by a car, and someone adopts that poor boxer.
He’s lucky he wasn’t walking his dog off leash in Kirkland. Where a guy just shot dogs who were attacking his dog. This is why I’d carry a police can size of pepper spray around. So you can spray the dog and the owner who assaults you.
@8 – We’re talking about pets… not the pseudo-yard dogs you saw in Honduras, not cattle dogs in Argentina, and not sled dogs in Alaska.
Pet dogs behave like total shitheads unless they are really well-trained and on-leash.
@13..well stated! I love visiting South America, Central America and Mexico and observing how beautifully free-roaming dogs regulate their own behavior w/o human intervention. Pets in Western countries are ENTIRELY different, though.
@13
that is the american viewpoint, and i am of the opinion that it is 100% wrong and i feel like i’ve seen more than enough evidence to come to that conclusion both in this country & in others. you believe the american position is right. that’s fine. be happy, most people in this country agree w/ you.
i believe we’ve handled it like we handle everything… in times of fear, as a people we follow the do it wrong playbook. ‘omg, a dog might bite someone!’ solution: create a set of rules that reduce the socialization of dogs & therefore encourage aggression. dogs are dogs. whether it is a cattle dog on the range, or an urban dog in the 3rd world, or an urban dog in seattle. the dna is identical.
hell, in my neighborhood, there are a group of roaming dogs that break out of their yards every day & cruise the streets. they know how to watch out for cars. they know how to interact w/ other dogs & in general are the best socialized dogs i ever see.
@14
why are pets in western countries different? are they a different species? no. they are the same. it is the people who are different. and in some places they treat & handle dogs & pets in a way that encourages socialization & decreases aggression. and in some places people handle pets in such a way as to discourage socialization & increase aggression. we discourage socialization & increase aggression. it is what it is. it will certainly never change, but that doesn’t make it the right thing to do & it certainly doesn’t make our dogs somehow different. it is WE who are different, not them.
Because behavior is not the result of genetics, alone, but rather a product of environment and genetics working together. I will agree that WE are different and accordingly OUR PETS are different.
I have travelled to Mexico more than 15 times in the last 9 years. I witness dogs that roam the streets and their temperments are the same whether Chiuhauaua, Pit bull or mixed mutt: All are super chill until their food or their territory gets messed with. I think this is due to a lack of human intervention
I don’t like dogs, nor do I like dog people. Dog people are just fucking wierd, and do things like smack other people with dog toys. And they tend to walk around with little plastic bags containing warm poo. Not a good look for anyone.
I thought the purpose of the cupped device was to not have to touch the nasty slobbery tennis ball after your precious poopsy brings it back in the same mouth that just licked its own asshole?
I walk my dog off leash and don’t give a damn what people think. This being Seattle no one ever says anything, anyway.
She’s a rescue and never approaches people or their pets so it’s all good. I wouldn’t, however, walk the dog off leash on capitol hill or anywhere as dense. That’s just dumb.
Also at Philosophy School Dropout…Just read that part where you said your dog is leash- aggressive/ leash reactive. This is a super common problem LOTS of dogs have. Highly reccomend you consult a trainer or read Fiesty Fido (Cromwell, I think??) It is actually fairly easy to manage w/ the right training technique.
Um, this isn’t about dogs, its about an asshole assaulting a woman.
$20 says the unleashed-dog-owning assailant is also that douchebag who won’t pick up his dog’s shit on the sidewalk. I concur with 5280: I love dogs, I really dislike a lot of dog owners, especially in urban areas.
Boxers are either fawn, brindle, or white. Never black.
@23 – Good work there, Encyclopedia Brown. You have proven that the boxer type dog in the report was not a purebred boxer. Bugs Meany has been foiled again!
You don’t have to go to another country to see well socialized off leash dogs – you just go anywhere rural. It is true these dogs do run the risk of being shot by jerks, or shot by non-jerks who don’t want them maiming deer (they often don’t kill them, just hamstring them and leave them to a slow death), if they’ve been seen doing that, but small packs of neighborhood dogs roam around 20-30 miles a day, play with kids and eat garbage and are calm and happy and sane. It’s not that the city dogs have anything wrong with them, it’s just that the city people have never seen what a really good life looks like for a dog, or else they’d 1) move, 2)not keep a dog in the damn city, where it lives a hobbled life.
Wow, so a dude starts hitting a lady, with her child next to her and nobody BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF THE DUDE?
Man Seattle, You guys suck. In NYC I can’t even talk back to the crazy preacher ladies in the subway, who are YELLING AT ME, because if I do every random dude on the train will jump me.
My parents cat was torn to shreds in their yard by a roaming pack of off leash and presumeably wild dogs in South Carolina, so no, I don’t think off leash, untrained dogs are “chill”. I’d like to chill ’em, though.
I don’t understand the last paragraph of this story. The assaulter is an asshole who just so happens to have a dog. He reacts with violence, and in this particular instance, it’s over someone seemingly hitting his pet.
This isn’t the dangers of dog-walking, so much as the dangers of being around other human beings.
What @21 said. This isn’t about dogs on leashes or pampered pets.
#11 FTW.