Director of Public Prosecutions Roger Gaspard is expected to receive a report on the dog attack on Point Fortin mother of three, Kurleen Cooper, who was severely mauled last month. Police sources revealed legal officers are working out residual matters and the file should be submitted to the DPP by early next week. Once all the information is compiled, the owner of the dogs is expected to face charges under Section 14, 15 and 17 of the Dangerous Dogs Act of 2000. Assistant Commissioner of Police Fitzroy Fredericks said he was yet to received the report on the investigation but should have it later this week. Twenty days after the near fatal confrontation with the animals, Cooper remains warded at hospital in a stable condition. On May 15, 36-year-old Cooper, who is now six months pregnant, was seriously injured by three dogs while returning to her South Central Road home.
She had just dropped off her seven-year-old daughter, Jahmiah, and five-year-old son, Jesse, at the nearby Salazar Trace Primary School when she was attacked. She suffered bites and tissue tear to her legs, genital area, arms, face, eyes and ears. Doctors at the Intensive Care Unit of the San Fernando General Hospital successfully operated on her right arm, which was almost ripped off. The Dangerous Dogs Act is set to be enforced on August 1. However concerns have been raised by dog owners and activists who believe the law is too draconian and unfairly targets just three specific breeds of dogs. During a walkabout at his Oropouche East constituency last month, Housing Minister Dr Roodal Moonilal appealed to dog owners and animal rights activists to have the law implemented first and then amended later. Moonilal said reports have shown that most of the dogs responsible for attacks on people were pitbulls.
The law seeks to impose strict regulations on dangerous dog owners, forcing them to have their pets spayed or neutered by a veterinary surgeon and registered. Owners must also obtain an annual licence from their local government body at a cost of $500 a dog. Also they must have a minimum of $250,000 worth of insurance for each dog. The act states that anyone caught with unlicensed dangerous dogs, will be liable to a fine of $50,000 and one year imprisonment on summary conviction. Last Friday, Vidya Emrit, of Palmiste, was fined $200 after failing to secure her German Shepherd dogs, which attacked then four-year-old Ezekiel Renne Cambridge. Last year, central Trinidad mother of two, Denise Rackal, was mauled to death by pitbulls as she was walking to her job site at the HDC Edinburgh 500 development, Chaguanas.
