Local council in North offers pitbull amnesty

21/11/2006 - 13:38:40
A local council in the North has offered an amnesty to anyone who wants to hand over their pitbull terrier dog.

Large numbers of the illegal dogs are being kept with an increasing incidence of them attacking women, children and other dogs.

The proposed amnesty will run for four weeks from January 2007 and all dogs handed in would be put down although their owners will not be pursued through the courts under the 1976 Dangerous Dogs act.

Council dog warden Nigel Devine said a recent pitbull attack on a family out walking in Randalstown Forest prompted the move.

He said he'd picked up a dog on Sunday which had been abandoned and was concerned that other owners don't do the same.

But, he said, so long as people were prepared to buy the illegal dogs, breeders would produce them.