Stephenville: Pitbull kills Black Lab, Owner ticketed

For weeks we had this black Lab running around here, roaming the streets. He was only out at certain times, so we assumed he belongs to somebody and they just let him out instead of walking him.

We tried to catch him, no go. We tried to follow him to find out where he lives, he kept evading us. Animal Control came out a few times, didn't work.

Last week he was killed by a pitbull. Animal Control wrote the owner of the pit a ticket.

Now ask me if I am going to walk my dogs any time soon. I know the pit is usually loose, he has followed us a few times with that red zone stare.

Maybe I should get one of those sticks the police has, because I'm not going to walk around with a baseball bat, and pepper spray has shown to be useless against red zone dogs in general.

Some of my elderly neighbors walk with a cane here, none of them needs it for walking..isn't that sad?

Every idiot in this neighborhood with a low self esteem has a pitbull to make up for it...all the wrong reasons. How do you live with that? Or a better question: what do you DO about it?

I personally love pitbulls, they are beautiful dogs, but as with every breed, there are some bad apples and because they are very strong dogs, they can do more damage. Now putting this power into the wrong hands and you have a ticking time bomb.

Eliminating the breed is not the answer, because another breed will take it's place in no time. When I grew up, the "bad guys" were the German Shepherds.

However, tougher laws on owners of exceptionally powerful dogs (above a certain weight and/or size maybe, which would include me too) might help. But laws need to be enforced and that's where the solution usually fails. Not enough manpower.

If everybody who has a dog above a certain size would need to obtain a permit and show proof of vaccination and proof of being spayed or neutered, that would be a start. Breeding such dogs would require a harder to obtain permit.

Germany has a very nice system where every dog owner has to have a permit, and that law is being enforced. Animal shelters there have waiting lines for adoptions, sometimes people wait for months before a dog becomes available! So I know it works.

Maybe it is time to propose a new law?