Letter of the Day | Lest we forget ...
Published:Sunday | March 23, 2025 | 9:52 PM
THE EDITOR, Madam:
I awoke to the piercing screams of my fiancé on the morning of our wedding day, July 21, 2018. She had just received the horrible news that her father, Whittington Cole, had succumbed to the wounds he sustained in an attack by dogs.
This wasn’t the first dog attack resulting in the death of a person. The graveyard of history recorded Valerie Stephen (July 2011), Ronica Gregory (December 2012) and Jerome Pow (February 2016), all of whom met a similar fate. And in all these cases, the owners of the dogs were unidentified.
Since 2018, I have read or heard reports of similar attacks, one of which almost ended the life of a teacher, and despite the deafening barks from the politicians about the repealed Dogs (Liability for Injuries by) Act 2020, the owners of these dogs remain unidentified. How come?
If the cost for rehabilitation and/or funeral arising from these attacks are not borne by the relevant dog owners, dawg nyam wi suppah. In other words, what else would induce dog owners to be responsible in ownership and safeguarding the public against these attacks?
In my mind, my wife, Marsha, has been sentenced to a lifetime of emotional turbulence having to relive that fateful day, every year, without an acknowledgement from the owner(s) of the dogs, much less an apology. She has been unjustifiably deprived of celebrating what should have been one of the happiest days of her life. Fortunately, as a strong black woman she is coping. For me, with each reported attack, I’m vicariously being tortured by nails being hammered into my body.
How many more attacks will it take for this matter to appear on the priority list of public safety?
R A SILENCE