Richard Polsky, Ph.D., an expert witness who specializes in animal behavior and dog bites, is presented to Oregon attorneys on this page.

If a lawyer in Oregon is looking for an expert witness to provide their opinion on a variety of topics pertaining to animal behavior, including but not limited to dog behavior, canine aggression, unprovoked dog attacks, irresponsible ownership, dangerous dog breeds, and other pertinent issues in animal behavior, it is strongly recommended that they get in touch with Dr. Polsky.  ^[1]Dog bite law in Oregon.

Expert witness’s opinion on animal behavior for an Oregon dog bite case

The following  is an example of  a canine fatal dog attack in Oregon that requires animal behavior expert opinion.  

In this incident that happened in Baker City, Oregon, in September 2013, the mother had taken her child to a babysitter’s home for the day. The babysitter had taking care of her children in the past without problems. The mother knew of the presence of the resident pit bull but not of a newly acquired one. The latter had been adopted from a rescue organization about two months prior to the incident. It was this dog that was involved in the incident.

Should the mother know about whether the dog was dangerous and could inflict serious dog bite injury to her child?  And more importantly, was the rescue organization negligent in adopting out a potentially dangerous dog?

According to online news reports, the boy was playing with as many as eight other children in the backyard, and either one or both pit bulls were in the vicinity. There is no evidence that the dogs were chained, however. The mother and babysitter were alerted to the incident by the children soon after it happened. They found the boy laying on the ground with the dogs nearby. He died shortly thereafter.

It’s possible that the children’s behavior prompted the recently adopted pit bull to attack in the absence of the boy’s overtly provocative actions toward the dog. Children during play frequently move erratically and fast, and they may vocalize in a manner that may be provocative to some dogs. The circumstances present in this case raise a red flag: namely, children playing in the presence of a recently adopted pit bull.

Did the rescue organization act with due diligence?

One assumes that prior to adoption, the rescue organization did its due diligence to ensure that the dog was a good match for the babysitter. Did they know this particular dog would be in the presence of children?  However, it is likely that the rescue organization lacked reliable information about the behavioral history of this dog.  Most pit bull type dogs in shelters arrive as strays or abandoned dogs. Thus one wonders about the degree to which this dog was adequately socialized to children.  It was probably not known. However, regardless of what the rescue organization knew, it is hard to understand why they allowed the babysitter to adopt the dog knowing that young children would be present in the home. It is possible that the babysitter presented false information on the adoption papers.

The dilemma faced by rescue organizations and animal shelters

Shelters and rescue organizations are often faced with a dilemma: their mission is to adopt dogs out rather that destroy them, but they may not have reliable information about a dog’s background to ensure a safe adoption. Shelters usually pass judgment on the dog’s temperament based on how the dog behaves toward shelter staff, and in many cases through behavioral evaluation testing. However, casual observation of the dog’s behavior by shelter staff may not be reliable because certain kinds of canine aggression only appear outside the context of the shelter environment, and therefore are never seen by shelter staff (e.g. predatory aggression). Moreover, behavioral evaluation tests administered in the shelter, even by a competent dog bite expert may lack validity if the proper techniques are not used, and if they are conducted solely in the cage of the dog or by inexperience shelter staff. Nevertheless, a recent study shows that pit bull type dogs can be adopted into homes without significant risk of the dog biting a person.

 Dog bite expert opinion about this fatal dog attack

Pitbull-type dogs have a higher standard to meet than most other type of dogs. Generally, in order to ensure that a pit bull with an unknown background will be aggression-free after adoption, it must meet the standard of consistently demonstrating over time its trustworthiness around people in the home environment and in a variety of other contexts. The bottom line: shelters and rescue organizations need to be cautious when offering for adoption a pitbull-type dog with an unknown background.