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An Open Letter to the St. Helena Star

To the St. Helena Star, regarding your reporting of a Pit Bull that did not "bite" a man, I'm curious about something. If this had been a Labrador Retriever, would your paper have printed the story? Considering how many Labradors bite, statistically speaking, I'm guessing no. Or how about a Cocker Spaniel? Or the Jack Russel across the street from my mother's house in Napa that tried to take a bite out of me? Where are all those reports?

Papers like yours that choose to report only "incidents" by certain breeds promote distorted public perceptions that lead to horrible laws which end up tearing apart families.

Incidentally, a 1991 study Cocker Spaniels to be amongst the dogs most likely to bite (http://www.dogbitelaw.com/PAGES/avoid.htm), but I guess "Cocker Spaniel incident subject of police report" doesn't have quite the same ring to it as "pit bull incident subject of police report."

-Dawn Capp-

Attorney at Law

http://www.sthelenastar.com/articles/2006/01/19/news/local/iq_3257805.txt

posted on Saturday, January 21, 2006 10:38 PM by admin

# re: An Open Letter to the St. Helena Star @ Tuesday, January 24, 2006 12:07 PM

As a brief update, I received an email from Doug Ernst, Publisher/Editor for the St. Helena Star. We spoke on the phone later, and he explained the paper published the story because the "victim" was vocal about the fact that he had been attacked by a "Pit Bull," and the St. Helena Star opted to publish the story to show people that this incident really wasn't much of an incident, and that the Pit Bull did not actually bite.

admin