Right now in England the newspapers are having a field day with the story of a little girl being mauled to death by her uncle’s pit bull. What gets me is that much of the focus has been on the breed of the dog. But the owner of the dog, Kiel Simpson, was a complete scumbag to put it mildly.
Mr. Simpson is a convicted drug dealer and police found heroin and cannabis at the home where the girl was killed. Further, it is suspected that Mr. Simpson fought the dog in illegal dog fights. So what are the Merseyside police doing? Arresting Kiel Simpson? No, they are out looking for other pit bull type dogs.
Some of the articles reference the fact that some of the seized dogs have cropped ears and that supposedly it is something done to dogs that fight. This isn’t true. For example, 5x Champion and registered therapy dog Diamond C Kennel Poison Whiskey a.k.a. Mako, has cropped ears. Bella, an American Staffordshire Terrier, has cropped ears.
My American Pit Bull Terrier has cropped ears:
While we didn’t crop her ears I’m not opposed to the practice if the dog has some rather funny “pricked” ears. Cropped ears are not indicative of dog fighting. In fact, why would somebody go to the trouble of cropping a dog’s ears when it will likely die in the fighting pit?
The bottom line here is that the owner of the dog was irresponsible to the point that he is largely responsible for his niece’s death.
