A family that owned a dangerous dog will have to say goodbye to “Baby Girl” after they failed to fence their property and keep her from attacking other dogs as they passed by.
The Staffordshire bull terrier cross came to be in owner Josie Brown’s care after she lost a close family member.
Despite having existing behavioural difficulties, the dog was a much-loved family pet, good with children and helped Brown in a time of need as she processed her grief.
However, Baby Girl also had a penchant for attacking smaller dogs.
Brown and her partner, Patrick King, live near a salt marsh in Tauranga, an area that’s popular with dog walkers.
Yesterday during their sentencing in the Tauranga District Court the owners said they’d tried to fence their property but couldn’t afford to do it all and despite their efforts to keep her inside the dog kept escaping.
In one instance, she’d jumped out of a window; another time she ran out of the front door.
In March 2023, the dog was classified as dangerous after a series of attacks and near-misses, meaning the couple needed to ensure she was never in a public place without a muzzle.
But in August 2023 the owners of a dog previously attacked by Baby Girl, before she was classified as dangerous, were again out walking near the Matua salt marsh.
The owner saw a flash of white out of the corner of her eye and said, “Not again”, according to her victim impact statement read by the judge in court.
She picked up her Shih Tzu, Lily, as Baby Girl continued to growl, jump up, and attempt to bite the dog she held in her arms.
The owner received a puncture wound to her ear, and a graze and bruise on her right leg and wrist. Her dog Lily had deep serious bites on her rear leg which caused tears to the muscle and ended up with a $1856 vet bill.
After this attack, council officers attempted to seize Baby Girl but the owners wouldn’t give her up and when officers went to the property a second time, the dog wasn’t there and they couldn’t find her.
Six months later, in February 2024, another dog owner was walking her Shih Tzu-cross, Tash, near the salt marsh.
She’d just walked past Brown’s house when Baby Girl ran out and attacked Tash.
The owner said in her victim impact statement the attack had been a total surprise and she hadn’t seen the attacking dog coming.
“It snuck up behind us and started attacking my dog,” she said.
“The dog was circling Tash and kept going at her.”
The 64-year-old had tried to kick Baby Girl away and fell over, letting go of the lead.
“The dog was right onto Tash.”
Two men came out – one of them was co-owner King – and they managed to get the dog off.
King said he would pay vet bills and drove the owner and her dog home.
The deep puncture wounds from the bites had nearly punctured Tash’s bowel, and the vet bill was $1874.37.
Following the second attack, council officers seized Baby Girl and she is now being held in the pound.
Tash’s owner told the court, “[Baby Girl] really needs retraining, but I don’t know if [she] can be retrained”.
Tauranga City Council prosecutor Victoria Brewer said an order for the destruction of the dog was no longer opposed, so the issue for the judge would be the level of fines and reparation.
It would also be appropriate for emotional harm payments for the dog owners who each witnessed their dogs being attacked.
Brewer said an aggravating factor was the owners were aware the dog had been involved in a series of very similar attacks, and of her “strong predatory instincts”, and the fact their property was unfenced at the front.
She said even after the dog was classified as dangerous, the property had remained unfenced, and no measures like a dog run, or tying the dog up, were in place.
Nor had they put something like baby-proof fencing in place so that the dog couldn’t get out the front door.
She said “there were many clear warning signs” that steps needed to be taken.
Another aggravating factor was that the council had tried to seize the dog, but King had refused to co-operate.
King’s lawyer Simon Whitehead said they were a family of limited means but they had made attempts to fence the property.
“A fence is not a cheap exercise to undertake,” he said.
They had tried to keep the dog in the house, and he didn’t think a baby gate would have prevented the dog from getting out the front door.
Brown’s lawyer Nephi Pukepuke said the couple had put in a fence around the back of the property, but because of financial constraints hadn’t been able to fence the whole property.
King addressed the judge and public gallery and said they were very sorry for what had happened.
“Our dog is pretty loved, we love her, we did our best to protect her and to protect the public,” he said.
They’d fenced their property as best they could but, unfortunately, she got out before they’d been able to fence the front section.
“We are sorry... we don’t see you walking around anymore,” he said to the dog owner, seated in the public gallery.
She replied, with a nervous laugh, that she hadn’t gone past the house again, because she was still a bit scared.
King said again how sorry they were.
He said his wife would also suffer with the loss of their dog.
“She loves her dog. It’s helped her [following a death in the family] and the dog helped with her grieving.”
Judge Melinda Mason said they both faced five charges under the Dog Control Act, of owning a dog that attacked a person, on a domestic animal and for failing to ensure a dangerous dog was muzzled in a public place.
The judge acknowledged that Brown had received the dog, who had existing behavioural difficulties, after a family tragedy.
“Really, this was a way of getting emotional recovery from this traumatic event,” she said.
But the couple had failed to retrain the behaviour, and the dog kept finding ways to get out.
“The consequences were really significant for the victims because their two dogs were badly wounded by these attacks,” she said.
The judge fined the couple $300 each, as well as a $325 emotional harm repayment for each victim, per defendant.
They also had to cover the vet bills for both victims.
An order was made for the destruction of the dog.
“Really no one wins out of this,” the judge said.
Hannah Bartlett is a Tauranga-based Open Justice reporter at NZME. She previously covered court and local government for the Nelson Mail, and before that was a radio reporter at Newstalk
The couple spend five months a year in America running their business.