Pasadena resident is arrested after roaming pit bulls bite 3 people; officer kills one dog
A Pasadena man was arrested Wednesday after his pit bulls attacked three people, police said.
About 8:20 a.m., police received more than 20 calls from residents in the vicinity of North Michigan Avenue and East Mountain Street reporting that “a small pack of dogs were roaming loose in the area and were attacking residents,” said Pasadena Police Lt. Alex Uribe. Three patrol cars and a helicopter were dispatched to the scene.
Two men, ages 69 and 76, and a woman, 59, were attacked and suffered minor dog bites before officers arrived. They were taken to the hospital for treatment, Uribe said.
He said an officer confronted the dogs in the 700 block of North Michigan.
The three dogs charged the officer, who fired a round from his shotgun, striking one dog in the chest and killing it, the lieutenant said. The officer then shot at another dog and wounded it before it fled with the other pit bull.
The dogs led officers to their owner’s home about a block away in the 1100 block of East Mountain.
The owner, Daniel Wyatt, 52, had been sleeping and was apparently unaware of the attacks by three of his four dogs, which escaped through his front door, the lieutenant said.
The two uninjured pit bulls were being quarantined separately at the Pasadena Humane Society shelter late Wednesday.
“The injured dog’s wounds were too extreme for it to come here. It went to one veterinarian and then to another. We don’t know whether it will survive,” said Ricky Whitman, vice president of community resources for the Pasadena Humane Society & SPCA.
All four dogs will be tested for rabies, she said. After Pasadena police complete their investigation, it will be up to the courts to determine the fate of the surviving pit bulls.
“Until it goes through the court process it’s uncertain whether they will be returned to their owner or humanely euthanized,” said the society’s animal control Lt. Nemesio Arteaga.
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Times staff writer Bob Pool contributed to this report.
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