Politics & Government

Put More Teeth in Law, Residents Say After Fatal Dog Mauling

Two dogs slipped their heads through a fence and attacked. Two hours later, the pug Maggie, a neighborhood favorite, was dead.

Birmingham, MI — The pug Maggie was a Birmingham neighborhood favorite.

“Everybody adored her,” Birmingham resident Terry Holmes told The Birmingham Eccentric.

So, when two other dogs attacked the 13-year-old dog and killed her, the neighborhood mourned.

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But they also sprang into action, starting a petition drive to nudge the city into putting more teeth in its dangerous animal control ordinance.

The  pooch and her owners were out for a walk on June 9 when two dogs that Birmingham police said had previously attacked another dog slipped their heads through the fence and went after Maggie. 

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They never escaped their fenced-in environment, but nevertheless, Maggie was dead two hours later.

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The owner, who faces misdemeanor charges, surrendered the two Dalmatian/boxer mixes to a shelter, but Holmes went ahead and presented the petition with four pages of signatures to Birmingham city officials on Wednesday.

“We’re brokenhearted that we lost our little Maddie,” Holmes told The Eccentric. “Birmingham is such a dog community — so many people have dogs and it’s just so important your pets are safe when you’re outside walking them.”

It’s unclear if the city will change its ordinance, though Birmingham City Commissioner Stuart Sherman told The Eccentric that “vicious dogs or bad dog owners don’t have a place in Birmingham.”

» Read more on hometownlife.com.

Photo: Keenan Browe via Flickr / licensed under Creative Commons

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