Dog Training School Sued After Customer Is Mauled, Hospitalized : Courts: Woman required extensive surgery after German shepherd she bought attacked her. The school’s attorney says she failed to follow directions.

After a series of obscene phone calls and unpleasant encounters with strangers, Angie Chan bought a trained dog for protection. She never thought she would need protection from the dog.

The 27-year-old Brentwood sociology student paid a $6,000 deposit in April for a $14,000 professionally trained German shepherd. The fee, paid to a protection-dog training school in Burbank, included one month of monitored instruction sessions between the owner and pet.

But one week into the regimen, during a routine training exercise at the school, the dog turned on Chan, biting and tearing at her face, head, neck, arms and breast. Chan was rushed to the hospital, where she underwent five hours of reconstructive surgery.

“She thought she was going to die,” said her attorney, Steve Rottman, who recently filed suit on Chan’s behalf against the school. “She put most of her savings and maxed out her credit card to buy a dog she thought would be her best friend and guardian. Instead, she’s devastated, badly scarred and has suffered a lot of physical and emotional pain.”

The incident underscores the dilemma facing urbanites who purchase aggressive dogs for protection. While many experts testify to the number of excellent protection-dog training schools, others point to a cyclical industry with loose, rarely enforced guidelines where business is often fanned by lurid crime reports.

Eric Sakach, a regional director at the Humane Society of the United States in Sacramento, says his regional office receives at least a dozen complaints a year from the public about problems with dogs purchased from training schools. Typical grievances involve a dog’s breeding, quality of training and overaggressive tendencies. Other customers wonder whether they have paid too much for their animals.

“The public has got to be wary--there are a lot of rights and wrongs in this business,” said Sakach. “Having a protection dog is like having a loaded pistol, and by purchasing such an animal, a person is accepting a lifetime responsibility.”

Buying a security dog takes nothing more than money. There are no restrictions akin to those placed on other security measures such as pepper spray, where state law requires buyers to pass a test, take a course or view an instruction video.

Experts say regulation of dog-training businesses, from which many people buy their protective dogs, is relatively lax. Before 1994, the state Department of Consumer Affairs required such companies to pay a $250 licensing fee. But after the Legislature deregulated the industry, the state stopped monitoring canine schools.

The majority of complaints involved the treatment of animals, said Jim Diaz, chief of the state Bureau of Security and Investigative Services. “The state Legislature felt established associations like the animal humane societies were better positioned to handle such issues.”

Los Angeles County officials, who say they are most concerned with monitoring dangerous communicable diseases such as rabies, provide few established guidelines for security dog training. While the city of Los Angeles requires protection-dog school operators to be fingerprinted and to perform a series of written and oral tests, most business activity is loosely controlled, if at all, experts say.

In this loosely regulated environment, Angie Chan, who recently graduated with a Ph.D. from RAND, the research and academic institution in Santa Monica, sought protection this spring. She purchased what she thought was a woman’s best friend: a professionally trained German shepherd to act as pet and protector.

She bought “Cak” from the California K-9 Academy in Burbank, which offered training sessions to help her control her new charge.

Chan refuses to discuss the incident. But her attorney, Rottman, said she began to notice ominous signs soon after she began training.

At an initial biting demonstration, Cak’s jaws had to be pried off the trainer’s foam-padded arm with a metal stick. On another occasion, the dog growled at Chan when she tugged on his leash. The animal continually wore a muzzle and was once called “crazy” by another employee, the attorney said.

Nevertheless, there were assurances from the company’s management and trainers that the dog loved her, that the canine would never bite her, and that she and the dog were “perfect” for each other, according to the lawsuit.

In May, after a week of training sessions, Chan was told by a trainer in one class to remove the dog’s muzzle to feed him hot dogs, Rottman said. Soon after, he said, the trainer tugged on the dog’s leash over Chan’s hand, and the dog leaped up and began mauling Chan.

The suit claims the trainer was unable to prevent or halt the attack once it began.

Rottman said that by the time the assault was stopped after a senior instructor arrived moments later, Chan had suffered deep puncture wounds and gashes to her forehead, left forearm, biceps, breast and the back of her head. At one point, he said, the dog grabbed her by the back of the neck and shook her.

A bite through her left eyelid has left her with blurred vision. Dozens of stitches and reconstructive and plastic surgery were required.

An attorney for the academy declined to discuss the facts of the case but said Chan was primarily responsible for the attack.

“We regret that she was hurt by her own dog, but what led to the injury was her failure to follow directions,” said Jeffrey Zinder, the school’s attorney. “She removed the dog’s muzzle and was bitten by the dog after being told not to remove it.”

The school has not returned Chan’s money and after 10 days of quarantine, Cak remains at the site. Zinder said the school is willing either to turn the dog over to Chan or assist in finding her another one once the balance is paid.

Some experts in the field of dog training say the fact that Cak was muzzled may have been an indication all was not well with the dog.

“You don’t need to muzzle well-trained protection dogs--you only muzzle dangerous, vicious dogs,” said Matthew Margolis, the author of eight books on dog training and president of the National Institute of Dog Training in Monterey Park. “An aggressive dog bites indiscriminately. A protective dog only bites when its master is being attacked.”

When considering a protection-dog training school, Margolis suggests consumers consider references, length of time in business and the facility’s condition. Before a dog is purchased, potential owners should research the dog’s breeding history and the trainer’s methods, and make sure the dog was raised with a human family.

“Above all, you must be able to trust the person you’re buying it from,” he said.

The California K-9 Academy’s brochures and flyers tout the school’s “licky, lovey pets” that provide “all the protection you need with affection.” Testimonials about the training expertise of the academy’s owner, Howard Rodriguez, are included from the Oakland Park Public Safety Department in Florida and the San Marino Police Department.

The caption of one picture of a child hugging a German shepherd says the school’s dogs “are totally obedient on and off the leash, inside your house or outdoors. They are housebroken, great with children and other animals and totally protective.”

Zinder said Rodriguez is a renowned trainer who has won numerous international awards. The incident with Chan was investigated by the Burbank Animal Shelter, an agency with jurisdiction over the school, which found that no laws were violated. Burbank officials said the facility has maintained an “up-to-code” standard.

Bob Mosby, a county public health investigator, said public files show several dog-bite incidents at the school since 1991 that have required quarantines. One employee was bitten on two occasions and another was attacked while feeding one of the dogs housed at the property.

Times correspondent Scott Collins contributed to this article.