Nonprofit Obtained 50% of all Breed ID Photographs in 2018

Photographs of six fatally attacking dogs in 2018 obtained from multiple sources.

Jump down to view all 2018 breed identification photographs or read our analysis first.

DogsBite.org - In 2013, we began the tradition of publishing breed identification photographs of fatally attacking dogs when available through news reports, social media websites and law enforcement agencies. Of the 36 recorded U.S. dog bite-related fatalities in 2018, 50% (18) had identification photographs, down from 56% in 2017 and 72% in 2016. Pit bulls and their mixes represent 83% (15) of all breed identification images collected in 2018, similar to last year.

Of the 18 cases with identification photographs, 56% (10) were captured by news media, down from 73% last year, and 56% (10) were located on social media pages of the dog's owner or family members. Half of all identification images in 2018, 50% (9), were the result of DogsBite.org research and otherwise may have gone unpublished. Police/shelter agencies only released photographs in 2 cases, yet 67% (24 of 36) of all deaths involved dogs taken into quarantine.

42% (15 of 36) of all dog bite fatalities in 2018 involved one or more fatally attacking dog shot to death at the scene by police or its owner.1

In 2018, nearly a quarter of the breed identification photographs, 22% (4), involved rescued or rehomed dogs that killed a person, of which 75% (3) had been vetted by an animal agency prior to being adopted out. 75% of these same fatal attacks occurred within 3 to 14 days after being adopted. In 2018, 78% (14) of all identification photographs collected involved family dogs that killed a household member. Of this subset, 43% (6 of 14) involved the dog killing its owner.

28% (5) of dogs with breed identification photographs in 2018 had a known history of human aggression before killing a person. Another 28% involved dogs with a known history of animal aggression (some cases involved both). 28% of cases with photographs involved the dog or victim living in the home for less than 60 days prior to the lethal attack. Two of these deaths involved infants, just 6 and 8 days old, carried out by a pet pit bull and wolf-dog hybrid, respectively.

Breed Misidentification Conflicts

In 2018, there were three breed misidentification conflicts; taxpayer-funded animal shelter officials perpetuated all three. The alleged "sausage dog attack" of Tracy Garcia in Oklahoma, can only be seen as fraud carried out by two employees of the Ardmore Animal Shelter. The cheeky media reports went viral, despite a statement by a veterinarian disputing them, the only professional who had examined these dogs while they were alive. The largest dog in the pack is clearly a pit bull.

It was not only the breed that Dr. Aldridge disputed, it was the weight of the largest dog too, which Aldridge estimated to be 55-60 pounds.

The second misidentification conflict involved a dog that was picked up as a stray on February 23, 2018 by Pinellas County Animal Services and identified as a "pit bull mix type." By March 14, the dog was relabeled a "Retriever/Hound" mix and available for adoption. The dog's first documented bite occurred at the adoption center on March 26 when the dog first met and bit its adopter, Paul Maser. Five months later, the dog fatally attacked an infant while under the care of Maser's wife.

The third breed misidentification conflict occurred in October after a family pit bull of eight years brutally killed its female owner in The District. Chris Schindler of Humane Rescue Alliance, the taxpayer-funded animal control contracting agency in D.C., deliberately distorted the truth about this "obvious" pit bull, calling it a "very large breed mix dog—mixed-breed dog" on television while standing in front of an Alliance transport van covered with large, vivid photographs of pit bulls.

Summary

With four public information requests still out at the time of writing this post, we believe that more breed identification photographs for 2018 will eventually be obtained. What stands out the most this year, as in the past, is the number of cases involving dogs taken into quarantine after a fatal attack (over 65% in 2018), but few police/shelter agencies released an identification photograph. We then can only rely on the news media being at the scene or images located on social media.

That 50% of all breed identification photographs in 2018 were the result of our research speaks volumes as well. Since "breed" is nearly always an issue after a fatal pit bull attack, and since a portion of taxpayer-funded animal shelter officials will lie to the media and the public to protect the pit bull breed, it seems fair that more law enforcement agencies should be releasing a breed ID photograph after a deadly attack, like the Citrus County Sheriff's Office did after a baby's death.

2018 Fatal Dog Attack Breed Identification Photographs

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Rylee Dodge, 3-years old, was killed by a pit bull in Duncan, Oklahoma that her father had acquired from a friend five days earlier. Rylee was under the care of her grandmother when the dog attacked. Her father raced home after getting an urgent call. He found his mother lying on top of the dog and Rylee lifeless.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Aurora Little, 8-days old, was mauled to death by her family's wolf-dog hybrid on March 7, 2018 in Lee County, Virginia. The dog fatally attacked the infant while she was in a bassinet. The family was also fostering two young children that had been approved by social services to live in their wolf-dog hybrid household.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Noah Trevino, 4-years old, was killed by a family pit bull-mix on March 25, 2018 in Converse, Texas. Noah had been playing alone in the backyard where the dog named Bam Bam was tied to a fence. When Noah entered into the "death radius" of its chain, the dog snatched him by the neck and shook him, killing him.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Hong Saengsamly, 49-years old, was killed by up to three family dogs in Milwaukee, Wisconsin on March 25, 2018. Her son Jack conducted a well-being check after not being able to reach her. He found her dead on the kitchen floor and her black and white pit bull guarding her. He shot the hostile pit bull twice, killing it.

See: Summary | Full blog post | All images | Tracy Garcia, 52 years old, was killed by a pack of dogs in Ardmore, Oklahoma on May 10, 2018. The breed(s) of dogs involved in her death became a national debate. Veterinarian Dr. Douglas Aldridge , the only professional who examined the dogs while they were alive, said at least one appeared to be a pit bull.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Georgia Morgan, 75-years old, was killed by two pit bulls after entering into the dog owner's yard in Gulfport, Mississippi on May 16, 2018. The owner of the pit bulls, Emily Craft, 32, was arrested after the attack on a 2017 warrant for two misdemeanor charges -- having a dog at large and a vicious animal charge.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Liana Valino, 9-months old, was killed by a family pit bull while under the care of her grandmother in Miramar, Florida on May 30, 2018. The grandmother told a Spanish-speaking 911 translator, "My son’s dog killed the 8-month-old girl," she said. "I locked the dog in the bathroom and the baby is dead in the living room."

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Jenna Sutphin, 28-years old, was brutally killed by a dogo argentino that she and her fiancé, Jason Hammer, who is a Prince George's County Correctional Center K-9 handler, had been breeding at their home in Huntingtown, Maryland on June 21, 2018. The fatally attacking dogo was an adult male named Rocky.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Robin Conway, 64-years old, was killed by a pit bull she had rescued from death row two weeks earlier. The pit bull, named "Snowball" (previously named "Bullet"), was pulled from the Logan County Pound in West Virginia by a rescue, transported to another location then given to Conway in Columbia, Maryland.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Teena Mawhorter, 74-years old, was killed by a family pit bull-mix in Siskiyou County, California on September 6, 2018. The brown and white pit bull-mix also attacked one of her daughters, who intervened to help save Mawhorter. An autopsy determined the cause of death was "severe blunt facial and head trauma."

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Khloe Williams, 7-months old, was killed by a dog while in foster care on October 5, 2018. Clearwater Police Detective Jonathan Maser was her foster parent. Maser's mother was babysitting Khloe when her dog attacked the baby. The dog had been adopted from Pinellas County Animal Services in late March.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Angela Smith, 55-years old, was attacked and killed by a family pit bull inside her D.C. home on October 14, 2018. Smith and her husband, Rob Frazier, had owned the dog for 8-years and raised it since it was a puppy. "I just left out the house. It was 15 minutes, and I come back, she was dead," Frazier said.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Triniti Harrell, 1-year old, was killed by a family pit bull that was "slinging the child around in its mouth." A deputy shot the dog once, which did not stop the dog, then shot it again, killing it. The 911 dispatcher had instructed the mother to, "Cut [the dog] across the bottom of his neck. It's going to release his jaw muscles."

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Cecileigh Garris, 6-days old, was mauled to death a pit bull while under the care of her grandparents. A pit bull at her grandparent's home climbed into the baby's crib and attacked the infant while Pamela Garris, the infant's grandmother, was in another room, according to a Citrus County Sheriff's Office report.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Sharon Daniels, 77-years old, was killed by up to three family pit bulls in Big Prairie Township, Michigan on November 13, 2018. She was pronounced dead at the scene. "Multiple dog bites coupled with some underlying health issues" contributed to this being a fatal accident, MSP Lt. Matthew Kanitz said at the time.

Post Publication Identification Photographs

Breed identification photographs discovered after the publication of this post on January 8, 2019. These photographs are not included in our overall analysis; they were unavailable at that time.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Bradley Cline, 62-years old, was brutally attacked by two male, neutered pit bulls belonging to his son on May 23 in Henderson, Nevada. He was rushed to Sunrise Hospital, where he died three days later. His son told police he adopted "Spike and Zeus" from the Henderson Animal Shelter eight months earlier.

See: Summary | Full blog post | Larger image | Kristie Kelley, 44-years old, was horribly mauled by a solid white mastiff that her husband was breeding at their home on October 23. She was airlifted to a trauma center, where she died four days later. A report from the Hunt County Sheriff's Office showed this was not the first time Kelley had been bitten by this dog.

How We Track Photograph Sources

We track the identification photograph's original source. There also may be multiple images in one case, so multiple sources may be attributed to a single case. For instance, after the death of infant Khloe, the news media shot original images and through a FOIA, DogsBite obtained the original adoption listing images. Also, the news media can be an overlapping (dual) category because they often republish images provided by law enforcement that the public otherwise would not see.

What is easy to see in our tracking and analysis is the rising number of identification photographs located on social media, from only 16% (3) of all collected images in 2013 to 56% (10) in 2018. It is also easy to see the remarkably low number of law enforcement and shelters that release identification photographs after a fatal dog attack. They supplied just 11% (2) of the 15 cases with identification images and just 8% (2) of the 24 quarantine cases after a dog bite fatality in 2018.

Photograph Tracking Categories

News media supplied photograph and/or an important republished photograph

Social media website supplied identification photograph

Law enforcement or animal control department supplied photograph

Animal control allowed news media to take photographs inside shelter

Canines shot to death at the scene of a fatal dog attack

Canines taken into quarantine after a fatal dog attack

Related articles:

01/11/18: 2017 Fatal Dog Attack Breed Identification Photographs - DogsBite.org

01/09/17: 2016 Fatal Dog Attack Breed Identification Photographs - DogsBite.org

01/14/16: 2015 Fatal Dog Attack Breed Identification Photographs - DogsBite.org

08/31/15: Who Can Identify a Pit Bull? A Dog Owner of 'Ordinary Intelligence'...

01/07/15: 2014 Fatal Dog Attack Breed Identification Photographs - DogsBite.org

01/03/14: 2013 Fatal Dog Attack Breed Identification Photographs - DogsBite.org