Two dogs are dead and several people injured following an incident Monday evening on the city’s south side.

According to South Bend police, officers were dispatched to a home in the 200 block of East Indiana Avenue about 8:30 p.m. for a report of a dog attack.

Upon arrival, officers reportedly found a pit bull with a stab wound lying in the grass and a woman sitting on the porch holding an injured puppy.

Witnesses told police the pit bull attacked the puppy behind the home and then broke lose from its chain and bit several people before being stabbed by the woman’s husband.

As police investigated, the pit bull, provoked by the puppy’s whimpering, again attempted to attack the dog, police said.

An officer intervened, police said, and was bitten on the hand, after which officers fired upon the dog multiple times, killing it.

Shelly Bryan, a neighbor who was sitting on the porch with the puppy’s owners, a man and wife, when the pit bull first attacked the puppy, said officers responded appropriately to the situation.

Bryan was injured in the attack, nipped on the hand and lip while trying to carry the puppy to safety.

“I felt it (shooting the dog) was very necessary for the well-being of everybody there,” Bryan said.

Although no serious injuries were reported in the attack, the wife, who was bitten several times protecting the puppy, was taken to a local hospital for treatment, Bryan said.

Unfortunately, the puppy did not survive, Bryan said. It was taken to a veterinarian clinic and later euthanized.

South Bend Animal Control collected the pit bull, which Bryan said she had never seen in the neighbor’s yard before Monday.

No one answered the door Tuesday at the home where the attack occurred.

Staff writer Erin Blasko:
eblasko@sbtinfo.com
(574) 235-6187