Service Dog Bites Child

I’m David Holub, an attorney focusing on personal injury law in northwest Indiana.

Welcome to Personal Injury Primer, where we break down the law into simple terms, provide legal tips, and discuss personal injury law topics.

Today’s question is prompted by a woman who called and said a service dog attacked and severely bit her young child when she and the child were at a restaurant. She was calling to find out her legal options.

Animals are not always predictable. To properly analyze the caller’s situation, we will need to know more about the dog, the child, the dog’s owner, and the restaurant.

Was the dog a trained and certified service dog? If so, did it break protocol with its training?

In other words, was it trained not to react with a bite even if provoked?

Improper training may lead to a lawsuit against the dog trainer.

Additionally, we would like to know if the dog was indeed specially trained and a genuine service dog. In other words, was it a seeing-eye dog? Or was it a so-called comfort dog designed to help relieve anxiety? What was the dog’s breed and size? Was the dog on a leash? Was the dog muzzled?

It will also be important to credibly determine what the child was doing at the time of the bite. Was the child provoking the dog in some way? Such as screaming at the dog, or touching the dog, or hitting the dog? Or did the child touch or strike the dog’s owner, causing the dog to feel protective? Was the parent monitoring the child?

Another essential factor would be to learn more about the dog’s owner. Could the dog’s owner have prevented the dog from biting?

Was the dog providing services that a medical practitioner prescribed? Or did the owner try to pass off an untrained dog as a service dog? If the dog was not a genuine service dog, the owner committed fraud against the restaurant and its staff.

Did the owner know that the dog might bite, given its history?

The law tends to grant leniency to an owner who is unaware of any violent tendencies in an animal. However, if the animal has bitten before or otherwise exhibited violent tendencies, the law is likely to be less lenient towards the owner.

Another factor is going to be the type of restaurant involved.

Did the incident occur in an outdoor setting, such as a patio or garden?

Or did the incident occur inside a building?

Did the restaurant try to prevent the dog from entering? Did the restaurant place the dog and its owner near the child?

Did the restaurant observe behavior with the dog that would have suggested a propensity to bite before it bit the child? Should the restaurant have ejected the dog and its owner before the bite could occur?

Did anybody take steps to try to prevent a foreseeable attack by the dog?

Depending on the answer to these questions, when an investigation of the incident is complete, it may be reasonable for the caller and her child to sue several potentially responsible parties.

I hope you found this information helpful. If you are a victim of someone’s carelessness, substandard medical care, product defect, work injury, or another personal injury, please call (219) 736-9700 with your questions. You can also learn more about us by visiting our website at DavidHolubLaw.com – while there, make sure you request a copy of our book “Fighting for Truth.”