Pit Bull Is Killed After Attack on Boy and Man

A pit bull terrier was shot to death by sheriff’s deputies Sunday after it attacked an unidentified boy on a Lennox sidewalk, a construction worker who stepped in to help the boy, and finally the deputies who arrived to investigate.

The construction worker, Joseph Rivera, 38, was bitten twice on the thigh when the dog turned on him. The unidentified boy, believed to be about 7 or 8 years old, ran off screaming with his leg bleeding after Rivera pulled the dog off of him, officials said.

“Mr. Rivera could very well have saved the little boy’s life,” said Sgt. Steven Fredericks of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

“I’m no hero,” Rivera said. “I got my own kids. That could have been my kid getting bitten. What else could I do?”

Rivera said he was walking to a friend’s house at about 7:30 a.m. Sunday when he saw a pit bull come out of the gate of a house in the 10700 block of South Inglewood Avenue and attack the boy, who was walking 15 or 20 feet ahead of him.

“I ran up and tried to grab the dog by the tail to pull him away from the boy, and then the dog came around and bit me,” he said. “The little boy ran away crying. . . . Finally I kicked the dog off me and he ran back into the gate.”

Rivera, bleeding himself, limped to a pay phone and dialed 911. He was treated by paramedics for two bites in the thigh.

When sheriff’s deputies arrived they found three pit bulls in an apparently abandoned house. One, believed to be the dog that had attacked Rivera and the boy, charged at Deputies Jon Thorne, Timothy Cain and Paul Kaser. All three fired and the dog was killed, Fredericks said.

Animal control officers later impounded the two others, a female and a puppy. The dogs had food and water inside the house. Only the female wore a collar with a license.

The owner of the dogs, Filemon Angulo, told deputies that he was moving and had left the animals to guard his empty house. Thorne said Angulo told him the dog had previously attacked apparent narcotics users who had trespassed through the yard but had not had a record of attacking strangers on the street.

The area is known for its drug and gang activity, officials said, and both gang members and residents use pit bulls as guard dogs. Thorne said the incident is the fourth in the last eight months in which sheriff’s deputies have had to shoot pit bulls in the Lennox area.

Thorne said the dog that bit Rivera and the boy apparently escaped from the house after a window was pried open in an apparent break-in attempt in the last few days.

He said no decision had been made on whether to cite Angulo for leash law violations, which could mean a $46 fine. Angulo, who could not be reached for comment, told sheriff’s deputies that he has rabies certificates for all the dogs.

A rash of pit bull attacks across the nation in the last year has prompted a number of cities to tighten animal control laws, including Los Angeles, where a measure has been passed making it easier to kill dogs deemed dangerous.