http://www.lifewithdogs.tv/2012/02/south-africas-dog-whisperers-dog-attacks-another-child/

So much for the dog whisperer, Bloody fool this man is!

omg!! im shocked at this really and his a Dog Trainer!!! http://www.lifewithdogs.tv/2011/07/africas-dog-whisperers-dog-attacks-4-year-old-girl-at-mall/

Oh that video is awful... very very sharp intake of breath here when I watched that..

OMG that is heartbreaking i have tears rolling down my face that poor child. is the dog actually staring at the girl before she comes into view on the camera?

nessa

Yes nesstaffy, the dog is watching the little girl from the very first scene, stands waiting for her return never taking it's eyes off her, dogs very often have their prey instinct kicked in by little children, from the high pitched voices and screams, the little girl could well have been using a high pitch voice giggling with delight or such. Or it may be a reaction from it's past where it learnt to dislike children. I wonder what type of aggression this dog had.

But no-one in their right mind allows a dog to go into the isle, you keep a dog in your view at your feet, especially in such a small area, the man was negligent in keeping his dog under proper control.

Seen too many times people talking for ages and not watching their dogs, they ignore them and think a dog will not be bored.

Whether the dog was and will always be a danger around everything it sees as prey we shall never know.

That poor child, horrific, but also have to say I would have made sure that my child came back in the same way she went out, I would never let my child walk past any dog, but perhaps the grandmother did not notice the dog in the first place?

I hope the little girl was ok, she'll definitely be wary of dogs from now on, bless her.

Carrington if you look at the firt post this dog was with his owner who is a self proclaimed dog whisperer/trainer in south Africa, he says this dog was a service dog, yet a few months after the little girl w3as attacked the dog did it again , heres the first part of the post,

This past summer, we reported on an incident involving a dog who attacked a little girl at a South African shopping mall. The story and video are no less troubling with the passage of time.

We were as shocked and outraged as you were. Now, it has happened again - with the same dog trainer and same dog. The dog, "D", was (according to his trainer) a certified service dog. This incident has left the service dog community, dog trainer community, and parents - reeling.

In this case, South Africa's self proclaimed Dog Whisperer's dog attacked a child at an area beach. The victim was once again a little girl. She was only 2 years old, and she was at a beach that did not allow dogs. James Lech was there with three large off leash dogs.

the dog has now been PTS,, :-(

i thought it was and while that was happening the owner had his back to the dog, which i don't think he checked at any time what his dog was doing all the way through that video.

Its so sad hope the girl and her family aren't scarred for life

Nessa

edited for mistakes

that attack was in july last year the next one was a 2 year old girl on a beach in Jan this year,#

i am still finding it unnerving that this man,, who calls himself a dog trainer would let his dog that has already attacked a child in public, go onto a public beach where it goes on to then attack a another child this time a 2 year old,,,,also dogs where banned from this beach yet he had 3 rotties all off lead walking around,, you have to ask yourself was he paying as little attention to the dog on this occasion as he was in the shopping mall,,

Had time to read everything properly now, including the trainers blog.

It's upsetting in that this was a lovely animal so many pluses to it and the owner obviously loved it very much.

I don't know why he thought the dog would ever be ok with children, IMO he should have protected it and muzzled it and it would be here today. Why would anyone ever chance a dog not doing that again, taking it for walks and giving it TLC and re-building trust, will not change this mindset had the dog ever been socialised properly to start with, it seems not. Saying afterwards that behaviourists indicated a neurological trigger happened when he saw a child, you didn't need a behaviourist to tell you that and he should have taken that on board the first time it happened.

He is extremely dismissive in saying that the dog was insured so any medical or psychological therapy the child needs will be covered for, almost as if he can wash his hands of it now then. He takes no responsibility himself, it's the dogs fault for having this problem.

I have no doubt he loved that dog, but in loving something you need to protect it from doing harm, the first time should have been the last, what a shame the dog had him as an owner...........

> s the dog actually staring at the girl before she comes into view on the camera?

I couldn't see the dog to start with, but when his head popped out in the isle, it was clear he was trying to get the little girl. From that point on, it looks, to me, as if he does not stop staring at the little girl, he was ready before she got close enough to grab.
However, watching it over a couple of times, the first time the dog pops out coincides with the bloke getting of his chair and the chair being pushed out - that is the instant the dog steps forward, the man then taps his pocket, the dog looks at the man and retreats (man is not aware of this, the fantastic bloke is not paying any attenetion to his dog ).
The man could have stopped this from happening if he was watching his dog. 

It was not an unpredicatable attack, the dog gave clear signals as to what he was going to do - the reason he did it, only the dog knows. He could have been guarding his space under the chair, it could be a knee-jerk reaction to him seeing the girl as the bloke spooked him by quickly getting off the chair/guarding the man, it could be the smell of food that kicked in his guarding, he may of thought the little girl was suspicious, he may have problems with children from his earlier life (what was he 're-habbed' for?) etc... all guesse work. But what didn't need guessing was the fact the dog was not happy with the girl and was prepared to act on it.

That poor little girl, how terrifying for her :(

Must admit I've been studying that video to try to work out what the trigger was, was even trying to see if the girl perhaps was carrying food and the dog was after getting to it. But can't see any evidence of that.

What I do note is the lady at the end table turns prior to the little girl coming back into the eating area and camera view, so perhaps she was being noisy for her to turn, no excuse I know but who knows why the dog reacted to her and what it's past was. Far too many incidents where a dog will turn on a child and see it as prey, the owner was 100% to blame.

> so perhaps she was being noisy for her to turn,

The little girl did look very active and it's easy to imagine her making lots of noise.
All of us dog owners - even with dogs with no history of aggression - should know that a childs behaviour can 'excite' a dog & that sort of 'excitement' can lead to unwanted behaviour. This is exactly why dogs & children should be supervised.

It's hard to believe that this was allowed to happen. The man knew the dog had a history of aggression yet he turned his back on the dog, in a busy food court, where all manner of situations could have occurred for the dog to react to.

>the owner was 100% to blame

I agree. It's astounding that he made the mistake in the first place, but to allow the dog loose on a beach with children after this, only for another child to be attacked is really unbelievable.

Some people aren't fit to own dogs.

yes just noticed that carrington the women also looked as the girl go got off her chair went round behind, and it looks like she tilts her head to look at the dog who has now stood up and is clearly watching the girl, you see the dogs ear he looks alert as the women turns  i think it looks like she is looking at what the dog is looking at which is the girl as the women looks round twice before the girls comes running past then she sits foward as if she waiting for disaster to strike, , and well i am shocked that this stupid man is totally unaware of anything going on around him,
i feel like taking my dogs anywhere is like driving a car you need to be aware of whats around you i cant believe he is so flippant, and in such a public place, havent my breed got a bad enough rep already without the likes of this so called trainer with his so called service dog making it worse for them,,

Does anyone know what injuries the girl sustained in this attack?

I only ask because (and im not in any way dismissing what happened) the dog is showing predatory behaviour, he is in effect stalking his 'victim' his responses to other things happening around him indicate heightened senses, it is fairly obvious to anyone paying attention to the dogs behaviour that he is fixated on this child and from what I can see his body position/stance was very tense(dont knw about you but when my dogs are like this i can sense and feel the tension at the end of the lead)  and when he does bite the girl...well, I would be interested to know what happened after he dragged her to the ground...was he gripping her clothing, was it a sustained attack/numerous bites etc (neither makes it ok, I am just interested).

I see behaviour like this dog exhibited every day with my collies (with each other, not children) they tense, stalk and the nip- especially if the 'victim' moves away from them.

I see behaviour like this dog exhibited every day with my collies (with each other, not children) they tense, stalk and the nip- especially if the 'victim' moves away from them.

Yes, you are right that is exactly what it was.

IMO if there was blood or even a proper bite, pretty sure it would have been reported along with a photo of the injuries, along with the fact that the owner and dog do not seem to have been prosecuted and the dog still left without a muzzle. (Although the laws may be different over there)

It was a stalk and grab, much like play as you suggest, personally I don't feel in any way it was a kill strike or even meant to cause real harm, though I obviously wouldn't stake a child's life on that.

The dog was taking the child down.  And I dare say it was exactly the same on the beach any real intention and a child would not stand a chance and be covered in blood. The crowd would not have been able to stop it.

But either way totally unacceptable behaviour and both incidents could easily have been avoided.

> pretty sure it would have been reported along with a photo of the injuries

Found something about the secind little girl, here it is.

It does say she needed plastic surgery for the bites to her leg and the poor little mites face is bruised rorm being dragged along the sand. The article also says that the dog grabbed hold of the girls leg and wouldn't let go - men pulled the dog off. It's highly possible that the wounds were caused from the men dragging the dog off, a dog can get one hell of a firm hold without causing major damage. (not that this makes the dogs behaviour acceptable,).

I know too well what damage can be caused by pulling a dog away from something it has it's jaws clamped around, a previous dog of mine had hold of another dogs neck, thanks to me yanking him away, it nearly killed the other dog, as the dog doesn't open it's mouth for you to pull it away, it keeps it clamped so the pulling action only serves to rake the dogs teeth into and tear through the flesh :(

I know I will sound like a stuck record but I don't care, if just one person can learn from my mistake then brill - please anybody, if you ever come accross a situation where a dog has it's jaws clamped on a person/animal - do NOT pull the dog - prise it's jaws open first or wait for it to slacken it's hold. The whole point of stopping an attack is to stop/limit injury, pulling causes damage to the thing the dog is clamped to.

These are such awful stories and I'm afraid to say, I avoid larger dogs with my kids.  Before I get the hate mail, I grew up with large breeds and have owned large breeds all my adult life but if I see a strange large breed dog, I will take avasive action to get out the way.  I know small dogs have probably more chance of bites but it's the damage that's caused if a big dog bites that concerns me.  I know this happened in another country but something really needs done here to monitor dogs and who owns them.  I just wish there was an easy answer as it's quite upseting to not want to take your kids to the park for fear of out-of-control dogs(not even mentioning my dogs!!).  And I'm not trying to blame large breeds for that, just stupid owners!!

I hope that man get's a good dose of Karma.  Preferably eaten by his own dogs to see how it feels.  Dog whisperer, my a£se!!

This is very upsetting to see and I only hope those poor children don't carry a lifelong terror of dogs.

Why on earth was this dog in the mall in the first place? Surely the owner must be aware that children would be present and yes they do run and get excited,after all isn't that a part of being a child!

It looks like the poor child wasn't even aware of the dogs presence until it grabbed her and she didn't stand a chance.

The  arrogance of this man to then let this dog run around off lead on a public beach beggars belief and quite frankly I find it vile that he then had the cheek to post a tribute to his dog after a child was mauled .

The dog should never have been put in this posistion in the first place and if he really did love the dog then he should have aknowledged that it had issues  and taken the appropiate steps to prevent such an occurence.

I'm  sure that I'm not the only person who is getting fed up with  these type of so called experts and  the old saying of a little knowledge is dangerous springs to mind.