By PAVEL BAILEY

Tribune Staff Reporter

pbailey@tribunemedia.net

POLICE shot and killed one of three unchained pit bulls in Abaco on Friday after a dog seriously injured a teenage girl.

The dogs reportedly tackled the girl –– a 10th-grade student of Patrick J Bethel High –– to the ground and bit her face and arm on her way home. When police responded to calls for help, they killed one of the dogs. The remaining two escaped. Police believe the dogs’ owner lives near where the incident took place.

The attack led Bahamas Humane Society President Kim Aranha to renew her call for the owners of unleashed pit bulls to face hefty fines.

 “My heart bleeds for the poor girl and her family. What happened was absolutely dreadful, but the onus has to go on the owner of the dogs,” Ms Aranha said yesterday.

 “I believe that the owners of any animal that injures somebody, it doesn’t have to be a pit bull, it can be a chihuahua, any animal that injured somebody because of the owner’s negligence, the owner needs to be charged. And clearly, if you have dogs that have been a problem before, and if you have dogs that are aggressive, which obviously these dogs were, then they belong in a fenced-in yard. There is no excuse to let them roam. And until the owner gets fined and punished to the fullest extent of the law, people will continue doing it. They just laugh at us trying to have laws that protect animals and people. Nobody in this country is taking this seriously.”

 Ms Aranha noted there is no animal control unit in Abaco. She said a board created by the Animal Protection and Control Act only has jurisdiction in New Providence. She said there has been little engagement from the government with the board since the law was passed in 2010. In the past year the board has advocated for dog breeders to reach certain requirements before being issued a licence and for more humane living conditions for animals.

 Ms Aranha hopes to soon meet the new Minister of Agriculture and Marine Resources Jomo Campbell.

 “We need his ministry to accept that the Animal Protection and Control Board is actually the competent authority over the pound and over many other things, like the licensing of breeders, the licensing of pet shops and the licensing guard of dog kennels,” she said.

 “We are the ones that should be sending the animal wardens out to inspect. The animal wardens need to be properly trained as well. We want to be able to bring someone to train them properly. The animal wardens need to be trained so that they can do the job that they are there to do. Right now, they haven’t received adequate training to do that job.”

 In the last year, some legislators have called for pit bulls to be banned.

 In April, St Anne’s Adrian White said it is incongruous that the country has banned the importation of pit bulls but not the dog’s breeding.

 Fox Hill MP Fred Mitchell later told The Tribune he agreed with Mr White’s call for pit bulls to be banned. Carmichael MP Keith Bell also raised concerns about the dog breed.

 Concern about dangerous dogs made headlines last week when British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced plans to ban American XL Bully dogs, calling them dangerous. His decision came after an 11-year-old girl was seriously injured and a 52-year-old man was mauled to death by two dogs in separate incidents.

 The American XL Bully was originally bred from the American pit bull terrier. Pit bulls were banned in the United Kingdom in 1991.