PALM COAST — The fight for a Palm Coast dog’s life will stretch into 2019.

A new appeal has been filed in district court to save Cooper, the 6-year-old Doberman-hound mix sentenced to death for biting a Palm Coast carpet cleaner earlier this year.

This time Cooper’s owner, Dottye Benton, signed the petition herself.

Benton filed an appeal in the 5th District Court of Appeals on Dec. 20, to challenge a ruling by Circuit Judge Terence Perkins in November that upheld a decision by Palm Coast city officials to euthanize Cooper.

But Erin O’Leary, the lead attorney handling the case for the city, on Dec. 21 asked the district appeals court not to hear Benton’s latest plea, arguing she missed the window to challenge Perkins’ Nov. 16 decision.

“Under Florida Rules of Appellate Procedure ... jurisdiction of this court to review the Circuit Court’s appellate order could be invoked only by filing a petition for writ of certiorari with this Court within 30 days,” O’Leary stated. “Accordingly, under the Florida Rules of Appellate Procedure and case law interpreting those rules, Benton had until Dec. 17 to initiate review in this Court.”

District Court of Appeals officials issued a written notice Wednesday giving Benton 10 days to respond to O’Leary’s motion to dismiss.

Benton was unavailable for comment.

The city’s decision to put Cooper to death stems from a Feb. 24 mauling when Cooper attacked a contractor who visited Benton’s Palm Coast home to clean her carpet. Cooper bit the man several times and ripped off a portion of his lip. The attack left the contractor disfigured and forced him to undergo reconstructive facial surgery, reports state.

Palm Coast animal control officers determined Cooper should be killed within days of the attack and Benton appealed the decision.

During an April 18 hearing, Benton sought to prove that Cooper was provoked by the carpet cleaner and asked that he be released to an animal rescue ranch for dangerous dogs in Hillsborough County. But a special magistrate ruled that the attack was unprovoked and Cooper must be destroyed according to state law because it was his second unprovoked attack.

Port Orange city officials declared Cooper a dangerous animal on Feb. 21 following a January incident in which he bit a neighbor of Benton’s daughter.

Marcy LaHart, an animal law attorney based in Micanopy, petitioned the circuit court in May to review and quash the special magistrate’s order. Perkins heard arguments from LaHart and O’Leary during a Nov. 5 hearing, and subsequently ruled to uphold Palm Coast’s decision.

Benton has mounted a vocal grassroots campaign since June aimed at pressuring local officials into sparing Cooper and shipping him off to the rescue ranch. She’s visited her dog almost daily since he was quarantined at the Flagler Humane Society in February.

In an email made available online Dec. 21, she asked for continued support from the contingent of animal lovers who have for months served as reinforcements.