£7,000 dog bite compensation awarded to elderly couple

In January 2005, an elderly man of 73 years, from Manchester, and had gone on a walk with his wife in his local park. They had stopped to sit on a bench, when a man walking his Alsatian dog came up the path towards them.

As the man got close to the couple, the dog pulled the leash out of his owner’s hand and suddenly leapt towards the elderly man’s face, biting him several times in the process. The owner of the Alsatian quickly pulled the dog off the dog bite victim, who had suffered serious injuries to his hands, in attempt to ward off the animal.

The dog owner called an ambulance and tied the dog on his lead to a tree as he waited for the paramedics to arrive. He apologised for his dog’s behaviour and gave his details to the shocked couple.

It emerged that the dog bites had caused the elderly man to suffer two broken fingers and serious soft tissue damage on his right hand. The injuries took over a year to heal to a satisfactory level, but still caused the man some residual pain.

Soon after he sustained the dog bite injury, the man decided to make a compensation claim against the dog’s owner, because the incident had caused him a great deal of pain and discomfort. The particular solicitor who pursued the claim on the man’s behalf had extensive experience of dealing with similar incidents and had previously helped a number of dog bite victims win compensation. His broad understanding of this area of the law played an enormous part in the success of the case, and seven months later, the injured man was awarded with a cheque worth £7,000 for personal injury compensation.

£7,300 won after a dog and his owner both attacked

In August 2005, Mr. Dan, a 32-year-old, was injured in a frenzied dog attack at his local park. “I’ve been taking my dog Harry for walk in our local park for years. I never let him off the lead; I always prefer to keep him on the extendable lead. He’s never been a vicious dog or anything but I can understand that some people don’t like the idea of dogs running loose.

One day, when I took Harry over to the park, I noticed that one owner had his dog off its lead. The dog came running up to Harry when we entered the park and straight away you could feel the tension in the air. The dog went for Harry and started attacking him, I tried to intervene, which is when the dog turned on me and started biting my arms,” Mr. Dan explained.

“The owner rushed and grabbed his dog off me; he could see that I was in a bad way.” Mr. Dan was taken into hospital immediately, and his brother took Harry to the vets straight away; fortunately Harry had only suffered from a few scratches.

At the hospital, Mr. Dan was given a tetanus jab and received stitches for his dog bite wounds. He suffered from a lot of pain and also flashbacks of the attack. It was then that Mr. Dan felt he should make a dog bite injury compensation claim.

After several months, the owner of the dog accepted liability and Mr. Dan received £7,300 in compensation which included money for lost earnings as well as his injuries, which were so severe, they needed further treatment in the future.

Dog Bite Leads to £28,000 Compensation

In 2002, a young lady was walking along a narrow footpath in her hometown with her own dog when another dog attacked her, biting her left arm and elbow.

A claim was intimated against the owner of the dog, where liability was accepted.

The dog bite victim was immediately admitted to hospital and was taken to the operating theatre. The injury required plastic surgery treatment and resulted in considerable short, medium and long term pain, together with psychological distress and disability.

Compensation was agreed in an out of court settlement, and the claimant was awarded with a sum of £28,000.

Legal action successfully pursued after man bitten by dog

When walking his dog, a middle-aged man was spontaneously attacked by another dog, which ran from the other side of the street. The man was bit on his right arm above the elbow, and then also attacked his dog that later, had to be put down as a result of the injuries it sustained.

The dog bite victim, who was 55, sustained severe dog bites to his upper right arm, which resulted in him having to undergo surgical procedures. He was left with severe scarring and lost muscle strength in his arm.

It was alleged that the dog’s owners, knowing the dog to be of a vicious and aggressive nature, failed to ensure that it was secured correctly within the confines of their property. It was also alleged that they failed to ensure that the dog was kept on a lead and muzzled in public, and failed to prevent the dog from attacking this victim.

The dog’s owners denied liability for the incident. However, a settlement was eventually reached shortly before trial, with the claimant accepting £3,500 compensation.

Golfer wins damages for dog bite

Professional golfer, Andrew Raitt, has reacted angrily at the award of a fraction of the compensation he was seeking, after part of his little finger was bitten off by a dog.

Mr. Raitt, 33, of Walton-on-Thames, Surrey, claimed his game deteriorated after the incident and had taken his claim for a seven figure sum to the High Court.

However, on Friday he was awarded just £4,900 in damages by Judge Sir Ian Kennedy.

Mr. Raitt said the incident, which occurred in 1995 at St. George’s Hill Golf Club, ruined his progress on the 1995 PGA European tour and damaged his potential as a Ryder Cup player.

After the ruling, the golfer said: “I am not just disappointed. I find it amazing that this can happen. “The damages are less than a shot in a round of golf on a half decent day.

“On top of that I am going to end up with a bill.”

The court heard Mr. Raitt had been walking his own dog, Nikki, when a German shepherd dog, called Zomba, attacked his pet.

The golfer intervened and was bitten on his left little finger which was shortened by 0.5cm as a result.

The case centred on Mr. Raitt’s claim that his injury caused him to alter his grip.

‘No evidence’

Counsel for Jeremy Lunn, the owner of Zomba, said, in court, that liability was not an issue and that the injury did not affect the golfer’s career.

The judge agreed, saying he was “not persuaded that there has been anything other than an imperceptible movement of his grip” and that this “has had no impact on his ability as a player”.

He said: “There is no evidence to lead me to believe that his career would have followed a different path to that which it has.”

Mr. Raitt was awarded £2,500 for the damage to his finger and £3,000 for loss of earnings when he was out of action for 10 weeks.

But because of agreed deductions the total award was reduced to £4,900.

He will also have to pay a proportion of the costs, believed to be around £100,000, because the defendants paid into court a higher sum than was awarded by the judge.

‘Fair judgement’

It emerged during the course of the ruling that the total claim was “in excess” of £6m.

Mr. Lunn said after the ruling: “We are very relieved it is all over. It was a very fair judgment.” Mr. Raitt was English schoolboy champion in 1986 and turned professional in 1994.

He is now ranked 320 on the European tour.

Boy in hospital after dog bite

A four-year-old boy is in hospital with a serious nose injury, after being bitten by a dog outside his home in Clydebank.

Kevin McCord was playing in his garden, where there were two Japanese Akita dogs.

One was tied to a fence and the other was running free when the child was bitten on the face on Friday morning.

Strathclyde Police say Kevin is in a stable condition in Yorkhill Children’s Hospital.

The two dogs were removed by police from the garden and taken to a dog home in Dunbartonshire. Police are appealing for anyone who saw the incident to contact them.

It happened just over a week after a seven-year-old girl was savaged by her family’s Neapolitan Mastiff in the garden of her home in Alloa.

Lauren McCormick suffered injuries to her face, arms and upper body and underwent emergency surgery at Yorkhill.

The dog, which the family had owned for only six weeks, was destroyed shortly after the attack.

An 11-year-old boy who shouted and threw stones at the dog is to receive a bravery award from Glasgow’s lord provost.