The owners of a dog that was attacked by an unleashed dog say “justice” needs to be served after their pet was hurt so badly it needed to be put down.
Angie Sharma and Farshid Tabari had to put their dog Max down on Saturday after it suffered serious injuries during an altercation with another dog while taking a walk through the Vancouver area of Coal Harbour. They say the other dog was not wearing a leash at the time.
“This was a life that was taken,” Sharma told CTV Vancouver. “Part of my life has been destroyed. Part of my son's life. Part of our family's life.”
Security footage from a nearby balcony shows one dog without a leash running along a path towards a smaller dog. A man is later seen trying to lift the smaller dog out of the way while another man comes running down the path. At the end of the video, a man and a woman are seen standing over the smaller dog while it lies on the pavement.
Sharma and Tabari say the reaction of the person walking the other dog was even more troubling than the incident itself. They say he argued with them and then just walked away.
“There needs to be justice served for Max,” she said.
CTV Vancouver reached out to the other person in the video, Kevin Newman, who says he hung around for 10 minutes after the attack, but the security video shows him and a woman leaving after just one minute.
“I would never wish any dog to be hurt,” Newman said over the phone. ”I'm a dog lover.”
“I tried to give my information. I told them to call the cops.”
Animal Control is now investigating the incident while the British Columbia SPCA says one way to prevent such attacks is to keep your pet on a leash.
Newman, on the other hand, is at least partially blaming the leash for Max’s injuries.
“He had a little rope harness on the dog, that's probably what made the internal bleeding,” Newman said.
With a report from CTV Vancouver’s David Molko
