After Child’s Death, PETA Calls for Pit Bull Breeding Ban and Other Protections

Mandatory Spaying and Neutering for Pit Bulls Would Help Humans and Animals Alike

For Immediate Release:
October 26, 2017

Contact:
Audrey Shircliff 202-483-7382

After a 7-year-old child died in an attack by two pit bulls in a Lowell backyard last weekend, PETA sent a letter (available upon request) to city officials today expressing support for laws that strictly regulate pit bull ownership.

In the letter, PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to abuse in any way”—notes that it receives reports every day of pit bulls who have been neglected or abused, many of whom unsurprisingly retaliate by attacking, injuring, or sometimes even killing humans and other animals. Animal shelters nationwide are overwhelmed with homeless pit bulls—but cities that have passed mandatory spay/neuter regulations for pit bulls have seen a huge drop in the number of dogs who end up abused, homeless, or euthanized in city shelters.

“Pit bulls are the most often abused, most frequently abandoned, and most likely dogs to be left in a backyard like a cheap alarm system with a beating heart,” says PETA Senior Vice President of Cruelty Investigations Daphna Nachminovitch. “PETA supports the city of Lowell in its efforts to regulate pit bull breeding and urges it to pass a mandatory spay and neuter law that would protect all members of the community, including the dogs themselves.”

Just one year after San Bernardino County, California, passed a breed-specific law, it experienced a nearly 10 percent decrease in dog bites. Springfield, Missouri, recently reported that before its pit bull ordinance was implemented, the municipal shelter had to euthanize hundreds of these dogs every year—but by last year, the number had been reduced to 26.

For more information, please visit PETA.org.