TRUMBULL COUNTY Quarantined dog is not one that bit daughters, parents say

The dog in custody doesn't have any sign of illness, the deputy warden says.
By TIM YOVICH
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
WARREN -- The identity of a dog that attacked two Brookfield girls who are undergoing a series of rabies shots remains in question.
James Shamrock, Trumbull County deputy dog warden, said the chow breed in custody was identified Tuesday by a police officer.
The parents of the girls, however, say the dog quarantined at the county pound is not the same one that bit their daughters.
Shamrock said Tuesday the dog at the pound has shown no signs of illness. "We're 100 percent sure" the dog isn't rabid, he said.
A dog bit Ashley Gregory and Kayla Purdie, both age 10, on Sept. 5.
Shamrock said the Trumbull County Health Department notified the girls' parents of the dog's capture.
Shamrock said the dog was at the pound the morning of Sept. 6 but was gone by Sept. 8. The deputy dog warden said someone broke the pound's fence gate and took the animal.
Because the dog was no longer quarantined for 10 days after reportedly being taken from the pound, the parents of the two girls had them begin the shots.
Mistaken identity?
"That's not the same dog," said Dan Gregory, Ashley's father, who went to the pound Monday to see the dog.
"They're trying to pass it off" as the same dog, he said.
His wife, Doreen, said the pound is going to kill a dog that didn't bite anyone.
Mary Peters, the mother of Kayla Purdie, went to the pound Tuesday afternoon. She said her daughter told her the dog being held wasn't the animal that bit her. Peters also said her other daughter, Amanda Purdie, said the pound dog was not the one she pulled off her sister.
However, Brookfield Police Chief Daniel Faustino said that John Izub, a township reserve police officer, identified the dog at the pound as the one he captured in Brookfield after it bit the two girls.
Faustino said Izub could identify the dog by distinctive brown markings around its collar.
Because they believe it is a different dog, Ashley's parents aren't stopping the rabies treatments.
Peters says she isn't suspending her daughter's injections, either.
Shamrock said the dog bit 9-year-old Danny Marker of Venice Drive in Howland, which is about two blocks from the Anderson Avenue pound, last Friday.
Stray dog
Danny's mother, Christina Marker, said a neighbor who is also Danny's baby sitter found a stray dog -- also a chow. When Danny went to catch the dog after it got loose Friday from the neighbor, he was bitten.
It is unclear, however, if the dog that bit Danny is the same dog that had bitten the two girls.
Marker said that she called the pound Monday and that the pound picked up the dog the same day.
She said she's not starting Danny on rabies shots unless the quarantined dog becomes ill.
Shamrock said the dog will be held until about Tuesday and then probably will be destroyed after authorities are sure it is not rabid.
The warden said they don't "have a clue" who took the dog from the pound.
Kayla's father, Randy Purdie of Farrell, Pa., expressed concern after the dog turned up missing Sept. 5 because not only did his daughter start the shots, but he feared someone else could be bitten.
Ashley's mother thinks the dog was lost or mistakenly destroyed, not stolen.
yovich@vindy.com