In the space of less than five days, a petition drawn-up in the wake of the horrific cat slaughter at the entrance to Lagos Marina on Monday has gathered hundreds of signatures.
The objective is to ensure that the German Shepherds responsible for the attack are not returned to their owner.
Says the text (supplied only in Portuguese), this is not the first time the dogs have killed, nor the first time the owner has let them go on the attack without attempting to intervene.
“They have killed several animals in the borough and attacked at least one person, leaving them with serious injuries”.
This is also not the first time the dogs have been removed from the owner and placed in quarantine at the municipal pound.
What locals cannot understand is why they were ever returned to a man who clearly has no control over them.
The owner appears to suffer psychiatric issues explain people who have met him.
“It’s serious that this individual continues to walk the streets and threaten whoever he feels like threatening”, continues the text.
“Authorities knew of this situation” before the latest attack – fortunately caught on video so there could be no denying how it went: the dogs were off-leash and left to swim the river from the Avenida to the long-established ‘cat colony’ on the Meia Praia side.
As the owner sat on the river wall, “unabashed and serene”, his dogs started terrorising cats as they found them, eventually cornering the one-eyed Amy and tearing her to pieces (click here).
Says the petition, other cats have mysteriously gone missing from the colony in recent months. Very possibly this may have been what happened to them too.
But now that the full horror of last Monday has resulted in the authorities temporarily removing the dogs, locals want ‘justice’.
“As citizens we demand the owner is taken before a court to answer for the acts of animals in his responsibility.
“We also demand that the dogs are not returned to him so that citizens and animals of Lagos do not run further risks of being attacked”.
Referring also to the image episodes like this could give the town as it reopens to tourism, the petition asks why a man with dangerous dogs is even allowed to live in a van parked in a municipal car park.
The vehicle is actually parked right behind the PSP police station.
Said a source: “Police know exactly where he is and how he is living. Why it had to come to this no one can understand”.
There are even reports that the dogs are left ‘off-leash’ at night so they can ‘go hunting’.
Be that as it may, the bottom line is that citizens want to feel safe – and the petition they have raised is rapidly gaining traction.
To access (click here)
Image: Sweet Amy who lost her eye due to an infection
