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Could I sue?

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sometwo

Senior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Tn

My dog has an invisible electric fence. His collar shocks him if he goes out of the boundary line. Usually the lower settings on his collar work fine. However there's a dog on another road that goes into heat and when she does I have to bump my dogs collar up to the highest setting.

It wouldn't be so much of a problem except they let this dog run . She has literally at times (this has gone on for at least a year now) sat at my door and whined all night wanting my dog to come out.

One time she brought several other male dogs into the yard and were fighting with my dog and caused the collar damage.

Now here we go again , this dog is in heat. My dog has a big gash on his head from a fight with these other male dogs she brings around. Then tonight she comes back with all these male dogs, into our yard again. My husband tries to get our dog in ( he's in the midst of all these other dogs and of course they're all ready to fight) and in the effort his collar comes off and he runs again. Its a never ending cycle.

I've cleaned the wound again on his head and he has more marks on his ears. I'm afraid we're going to need to take a trip to the vet if it doesn't start healing soon.

Would I be able to sue the woman with the female dog for all this? (for vet bills, his collar , and just plain dealing with her dog) If not would there be anything else I could do ? I'm so frustrated over it. Its gone on too long.

ETA: I've also thought I needed to start taking pictures when this dog is in my yard and when it brings the other dogs plus the gas on his head etc. Would that help?
 


justalayman

Senior Member
you can sue whomever's dog is attacking your dog while on your property. Once your dog is off your property without a leash, you are just as guilty as any other owner. If your dog leaves your property, obviously it is not restrained either.

You can call the animal control people to report the wandering dogs.
 

sometwo

Senior Member
I don't know who all the other dogs belong too. There's so many male dogs she brings with her. I just know where she lives.

I know the collar incident happened on my property for sure. I'm not sure what all happened tonight with my husband I haven't had a chance to talk to him about it.

I was hoping since she was bringing the darn dogs into my yard I could maybe sue them.
 

justalayman

Senior Member
I don't know who all the other dogs belong too. There's so many male dogs she brings with her. I just know where she lives.
Just like most other crimes: if you cannot identify the culprit, you cannot prosecute them. If this female is coming into your yard, you can report that dog and identify the owner. It would appear that getting that dog controlled would be your best course to solve the problem.
 

sometwo

Senior Member
I went and talked to the owner of the female dog today. We will see if that helps. I had to take my dog to the vet. His head wound got infected and now he has a leg wound. I can't even let him out in my own yard now without checking because they all keep invading my yard.

I'm scheduling my dog to get neutered when his infection clears but I am still worried that even if he's neutered and in the yard the other dogs can still come into my yard and hurt him.

I guess we'll have to see .
 
As others have said: call Animal Control immediately when you see strange dogs roaming. Why wait until they're on your property and harassing your dog?

The owner of the female is being more than irresponsible. While dogs are intelligent creatures and can find loopholes and niches to escape via, it shouldn't happen so often (unless, of course, the dog is smarter than the owner). Definitely not so often that it causes you so many issues.

I'm not an "Animal Control" person ~ I prefer the Humane Society any day of the week (I'm an animal lover to the core). But in this case, not only is your dog being injured, but the female could easily be hit by a car on her trek from the "other road."

And I'll bet that if you happened upon her body on the side of the road, you'd feel awful and will have wished that someone could have done something. Perhaps Animal Control coming out and giving the owners a warning might be that "something."

I wish you the best of luck with this!!
 
You likely could be able to get a trap for the dog from animal control or somewhere else, trap the dog & then call AC to pick up the bitch.
 

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