‘They just attacked my boy’: Dog attack in Saskatoon kills Pomeranian, leaves neighbourhood in fear

WATCH: Residents in Saskatoon’s Haultain Neighbourhood are on edge after a dog injured a woman and killed her dog last week.

Susan O’Donnell says there’s nothing her Pomeranian Ryder enjoyed more than his daily evening walk. But it’s Ryder’s last walk she’ll never be able to forget.

“I suddenly saw three large, muscular dogs charging toward us,” O’Donnell said. “They looked like they were in full attack mode.”

“They just attacked my boy, and I just knew that he would probably not survive.”

O’Donnell said three pitbulls attacked Ryder and knocked her to the ground on May 15 as she crossed Sixth Street East across Dufferin Avenue as she returned home along her normal route.

O’Donnell said she was helpless as she watched her close companion of nine years suffer.

“I didn’t have time to do anything. I just froze, tried to pick him up, but the dogs came at us and knocked me down and got a hold of my boy,” she said.

Neighbours soon came to help her, and a man running behind the three dogs took them away. One of the neighbours eventually put a blanket over Ryder. O’Donnell then took Ryder to a vet clinic, where she ultimately decided to euthanize her dog.

“It was the most traumatic event I’ve been through in my life,” O’Donnell said.

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Melanie Kenny lives two doors down from where the pitbulls escaped from. She says the dogs have been a growing concern in the neighbourhood over the past three years and can think of half a dozen close calls that nearly resulted in an attack.

“Every morning and every afternoon, I am worried a child will be fatally attacked,” Kenny said.

Kenny has seen children run in fear from the dogs.

Other neighbours told CTV they have called the Saskatoon Animal Control Agency and filed complaints about the animals. One resident said she has avoided walking her dogs altogether out of fear of being attacked by the animals.

Kenny has warned as many people as she could and was recently told by the home’s landlord that the tenant currently living there will be evicted on May 31. She says if that doesn’t happen, she and nearby residents will protest outside the home.

“If something happens to a child, I can’t go to myself, ‘I should have done something,’” she said. “I’m doing something, and I’m making sure this happens. And if it doesn’t happen, I have a strategy.”

A friend of the tenant, who would only identify himself as Dan, said he was in the backyard helping his friend pack to move on the day of the attack. After watching video surveillance, he realized he didn’t latch the second lock on the two-lock side gate the pitbulls escaped from.

“I wasn’t sure. Trying to replay everything in my head if I put both locks in, and yeah, I honestly feel horrible about myself,” he said.O’Donnell says she has been overwhelmed with the support she’s received since the attack. She suffered some cuts on her hands and has started to make sense of what happened.

She says laws need to be changed to prevent this from happening to someone else in the future.

“People shouldn’t have to worry when they’re out for a walk with their dog that they’re going to possibly be attacked,” O’Donnell said.

Saskatoon Animal Control Agency says it is aware of the attack and refused to comment further while the investigation is underway.