By MIKE MATHER in Rotorua
A Rotorua man is calling for people to be on the alert for roaming dogs after he was viciously attacked.
Warren James spent three days in Rotorua Hospital after what he believes was a bull mastiff cross attacked him. Now he's calling for the dog's owner to come forward before someone else suffers worse injuries.
Mr James said he had been at a friend's house and was walking to the Caltex service station on Ranolf St when the dog lunged at him from behind a hedge near the corner of Pererika and Phillip Sts at about 9.30pm last Thursday.
"It was like it was going for my throat.
"I put up my arm to shield myself and it just latched on to it.
"I kneed it in the chest and it let go for a second, but then it bit me on the arm again.
"It really took a couple of bites out of me.
"I managed to give it a kick in the head and it ran off, but it has left me with a big wound that is going to take a while to heal."
Mr James said the attack had also shaken his trust in animals and he's concerned for others living in the area, including his seven-year-old daughter who often stays in the area with her mother.
Rotorua District Council senior animal control officer Kevin Coutts said under the new Dog Control Act regulations he had to refer the attack on Mr James to police because the attack had caused serious injury.
Police could not be contacted for comment, but if found and convicted, the dog's owner could be fined up to $20,000 or be jailed for up to three years.
Mr James' experience was the latest of several which have occurred around the city recently.
In January a couple exercising their two dogs in Boord Park, Rotorua, had one of their pets savagely attacked by a pit bull dog being walked by a teenage boy.
The same month an elderly man was attacked by a pitbull cross while waking a dog in Rotorua's eastern suburbs and another dog rushed and mauled a dog on a leash in Western Heights.
All three dogs were located and destroyed.
Early this month an elderly woman pleaded for dog owners to act more responsibly after her arm was broken when she was struck by a dog while walking across a reserve.
Mr Coutts said while the number of incidents around Rotorua had suddenly increased, he did not see it as a sign the problem was getting worse.
"If anything, things are slowly getting better. People are slowly being educated about how important it is to keep their dogs under control.
"Of course, if a certain type of person wants to have a certain type of dog then they will. The thing is, if owners kept their dogs on a lead, then we would have no problems at all.
"When incidents like this happen, it's the dogs that end up copping the ultimate penalty. The owners always get off lightly by comparison."
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.
Latest from Rotorua Daily Post
Rest home owner and staff told to apologise to man's family
The man had a fall inside the rest home and died two weeks later.