Thursday, July 12, 2007
WARREN — A judge has dropped the city of Niles and the Niles SCOPE senior citizens center on Main Street from a lawsuit filed by a Niles man who claims he was bitten by a dog at the center in 2004.
In a judgment entry, Judge W. Wyatt McKay of Trumbull County Common Pleas Court ruled that the dog owned by Ralph Catone Sr. did not belong to either the city, which owns the senior center, or SCOPE, which runs it.
Edwin Titus of Crain Drive, Niles, sued the city, SCOPE and Catone after Catone’s dog bit Titus while Catone’s vehicle was parked at the SCOPE center.
The entry says Catone was not an employee of SCOPE or the city and had never brought the dog inside the center on any of his previous visits there. The portion of the lawsuit against Catone will proceed, the rulings says.